


Always one foot on the ground

by spacecuppa (EmmaLikesTheInternet)



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: AU where nobody dies and everything is fine, Academia, Alternate Universe - College/University, Authentic Britishness, Awkward Flirting, Canon Asexual Character, Cliche, Fluff, Found Family, Intimacy, Jon Overworks Himself because of course he does, Learning to be vulnerable, Love Languages, Martin makes tea, Multi, Mutual Pining, Mystery, OR IS IT??, Slow Burn, Strong Language, The Mortifying Ordeal of Being Known, University drinking culture, background Melanie/Georgie - Freeform, daisy and jon being besties, jon has no social skills, minor references to sex and drug use, past georgie/jon, realising you love your friends, somewhere between a romantic comedy and scooby doo, tim and sasha are in love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-19
Updated: 2021-02-23
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:20:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 38,478
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24272719
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmmaLikesTheInternet/pseuds/spacecuppa
Summary: Jonathan Sims likes books more than people. When he applied to do a Masters in Egyptian Archaeology, he certainly didn't expect all thesepeopleto become part of his life. Between oversharing collaborators, creepy supervisors, obnoxious assistants, unhinged acquaintances, confusing second-years, and a woman literally living on his sofa-- he really can't cope with any extra pressure.So, when discrepancies start appearing in the research around the Serapeum of Alexandria, Jon does what anybody would.He keeps on searching. And two mysteries emerge: one, an ancient conspirary suspiciously absent from recorded history; the other, an entirely more terrifying investigation into the people around him. Their habits, their interests, their motivations, their feelings, how they take their tea.Looks like he won't be finding the answers in his books, this time.(University AU, loosely inspired by the mentions of the Serapeum in MAG 53: Crusader)
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims, Sasha James/Tim Stoker
Comments: 70
Kudos: 166





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Work title from Fidelity by Regina Spektor <3 
> 
> BASICALLY the premise is: as part of his MA in Egyptian Archaeology, Jon has been given a grant to lead a research project, and Sasha, his academic acquaintance who is doing a slightly different specialism, is helping him out while also working on her own paper. Martin and Tim have volunteered their assistance to fill some credits (?) / work experience. They're all a similar age because gap years. 
> 
> DISCLAIMER my knowledge of university comes from obsessively watching Fresh Meat and the little information I have retained from open days. I have done a fuckload of research though so
> 
> This could be set in any redbrick city uni in the UK but in my head it's Birmingham. 
> 
> I've been BUZZING to post this as my first Magnus fic!! Quarantine had me consuming this podcast like, well, Jon. And the fandom are so lovely and the support is amazing. All of the fan-work is so inspiring. I really hope you enjoy this, thank you !!! <3

The Social Sciences library was two or three miles off campus, nestled between a high-rise block of flats and some gated gardens. It hadn’t been refurbished in a good few decades, and certainly smelt like it; the cloying mustiness of old books hit like a wave as soon as you crossed the threshold.

Jon found that he liked it just fine. It was so out of the way of everything that, even in exam season, he could work completely undisturbed. Within four run-down walls, he had everything he needed: a couple of seminar rooms, a break room with a kettle, his supervisor’s office, books and articles and journals and reports and peace and quiet.

A peace and quiet that was, unfortunately, about to be broken. Jon cracked open the door to the seminar room he’d been loaned in lieu of an office. It had a single, huge window, looking out onto trees and greenery, dripping from the April showers. The room was dominated by a long, rectangular table for work and discussion, and, reluctantly, Jon seated himself at the head. Smaller than he expected, but it would suffice.

He opened his laptop and was just refreshing his emails when a figure appeared in the doorway, knocking hesitantly on the open door.

“Jonathan Sims?” he asked. Jon wasn’t great at discerning emotions, especially with new people, but even he could tell the man was nervous, the skittishness seeming oddly disproportionate to his large frame.

“Just Jon, please.” He stood up, extending his hand distractedly. “You’re early.”

“I’m Martin Blackwood. Second year, Anthropology and English Literature. Thank you for the opportunity.” His handshake was surprisingly warm and trustworthy.

Jon faltered. “Um, right. Are you sure you’re in the right place?”

“Seminar room SSC4? You’re doing a research project on the Serapeum of Alexandria, right?” He was hovering, which Jon found faintly irritating.

“Sit down, please.” He gestured to the chair to his left. “That is all correct. I must’ve read the email wrong, is all. I find it hard to see what either of your subjects have to do with what is, inherently, an _Archaeology_ project.”

“Uh. Books?” Martin was dripping onto the table, hair damp with rain, and Jon tried to figure out a way of moving his laptop away from the man without seeming rude. “Tim and I, um, the other second year. We’re doing a module on Egyptology for Anthro. Like, comparing the development of ancient civilisation to the influences of imperialism and war, and, uh, stuff.”

“Fascinating,” Jon said, turning back to an email he was drafting. There was an uncomfortable silence. Jon was conscious of the beating on the roof, the room’s warmth and yellow light becoming a haven away from the downpour.

“Jon! Sorry I’m late.” Jon blinked up at Sasha, stuffing an umbrella into her bag while the other hand waved a greeting.

He looked at his watch. “You’re three minutes early.”

“I know, I just wanted to help set up. Horrible out there, isn’t it? You must be Martin. I’m Sasha, I’m doing a masters in structural Archaeology. Lovely to meet you.”

“You too!” Martin smiled brightly. After shaking his hand, she began to unload the books in her tote bag, while Martin inspected the titles with an animated interest.

“Tim not here yet, then?”

“No. You know him?” Martin asked.

Sasha sighed. “I’ve had the pleasure of his acquaintance, yes.” The look they exchanged suggested they were sharing a joke Jon didn’t understand, and already he felt slightly alienated. It wasn’t exactly an unusual feeling for him.

The fourth and final member of the project arrived after ten more minutes of Martin and Sasha’s personable chatter. He barged in without knocking, greeting the others with a slap on the shoulder.

“And you must be Jonathan. Timothy Stoker, second year, Anthropology.” Thankfully, Jon only got a handshake, and a wink so smooth he rather felt like he’d imagined it.

“It’s Jon.” Already, Tim’s attention was elsewhere, flicking through one of Sasha’s books with his muddy boots propped up on the table. Jon considered telling him to sit properly. But, it occurred to him, it was university property so he didn’t really give much of a shit; they were far too tight on his research grant, so it was something like reparations. 

“Right. Thank you all for agreeing to be a part of this. I hope it’s as useful for you as it will be for me. Um, if you don’t mind me asking, how come you aren’t…Archaeology students? If you’re interested in this project?”

“Don’t think the actual Archaeology students were super keen. Not the most popular of the postgrad projects,” Tim said. Jon found himself meeting Martin’s eye for confirmation, who gave an apologetic shrug.

“I think Egyptology’s really interesting, though,” said Martin generously.

Tim threw his arms up in enthusiasm. “EXACTLY! First known empire, ancient and powerful, reading and writing and conquering and building while Europeans were still shitting in their caves. WHY does nobody talk about this.”

Sasha gave him a look that was unmistakably soft. Jon inhaled, lifting his glasses to massage his eyes.

“Well, I’m glad you’re enthusiastic. I suppose that’s what matters.” Both men beamed at him. “SO LONG as you have the research skills I require.”

They all jumped to assure him that that wouldn’t be a problem, and, actually, they’d be sure to get along _absolutely_ fine. And, for the next few hours, they all put their heads down and worked in silence.

-

When Jon got home, there was a woman sleeping on his sofa.

“Right,” he said to himself, peeling off his soaked jacket and tossing it on the armchair. Georgie had a lecture, so there was a possibility the mystery woman had climbed through the window or something, although presumably she wasn’t a thief, because she was very soundly asleep. 

The Admiral wound around his ankles, seemingly unconcerned by the stranger in the flat. Jon tried to figure out what to do. She was about uni age, with brightly dyed hair peeking out from under his quilt, which reminded him of all the faintly intimidating women who discussed Marxist theory over pints in the SU. So, it was conceivable that she was one of Georgie’s friends, but surely she would’ve texted to warn him. 

Rather than dealing with the issue, Jon decided to read at the kitchen table instead. Maybe she’d go away.

Sasha rung him just as he was debating making a cup of tea. He jumped, hoping his ringtone didn’t wake the stranger.

“Hello?”

_Hiya, you alright?_

“Yes, thank you. Well, there’s a strange woman on my sofa.”

The line distorted for a moment as Sasha snorted loudly. _That’s unfortunate._

Jon did his best to briefly describe her. “You know anyone of that description? Any of Georgie’s friends or something?”

_Jon, you’ve just described every edgy white student I’ve ever met, so I can’t help you there. Sorry._

“Shame. You seem to know a lot of random people. Like, you even know Tim, which was odd.”

_Yeah. Hooked up with him at a party like, several months ago. It’s nice that he remembered me, actually._

Jon spluttered. “WHAT?”

Sasha hummed.

“He’s our research assistant, Sasha. That’s… well-“

_He wasn’t back then, was he? Besides, I didn’t realise he was a bit younger until the situation had escalated. And by that point he was very…persuasive. You know how it is._

“Sasha! No I don’t!” As always, Jon was disproportionately horrified. This didn’t seem like a _normal_ thing to share with a colleague whom you barely knew, but Jon’s idea of what was normal sometimes seemed to vary to everyone else’s.

_He’s lovely, though, isn’t he? And Martin seems sweet. Anyway, that reminds me, I was going to make a WhatsApp chat. Do you mind if Tim and Martin have your number?_

“What? No, that’s fine, that’s good thinking, actually, I—” Jon nearly jumped out of his skin when a disgruntled head peered into the kitchen. “Sasha, I’m going to have to call you back.”

He hung up hesitantly as the strange woman entered the kitchen. In full view, she was rather short. She certainly had the intimidating air of all of Georgie’s friends, with an old band shirt and scuffed Doc Martens. Her arms were crossed with irritation. “Do you mind keeping it down? I’m trying to sleep.”

Jon blinked. “Right. Who the fuck are you?”

She stared at him evenly and said, “Melanie King. Paranormal investigator. It’s Jon, right?”

“Y-yes?” He offered his hand to shake, but she just scoffed. “If you don’t mind me asking…are you paranormally investigating my flat?”

She gave him a once-over that might’ve been confrontational, but Jon couldn’t tell. It succeeded in making Jon feel very stupid. Yet, when she spoke, her tone was perfectly pleasant, although Jon was still unsettled, which he thought was kind of understandable considering the situation.

“No. Georgie said to get going with pasta night though. With an extra portion. I’ll be asleep if you need me,” Melanie said, leaving him be with an amicable nod.

Pasta Thursdays was a strange, heavy-handed domesticity that they shared. It was an attempt to cobble a home from what they had; pasta being one of the only meals that they could make well, which, to Jon, summed up the hopelessness of the whole attempt.

They’d signed the lease for the flat shortly before they broke up; during the summer, Georgie returning up north to her family, Jon nabbing an interesting internship in Birmingham. It was a period of withdrawal and, at least for him, loneliness, that seemed to cast glaring sunlight on all their differences. Keeping the flat arrangements made sense. They were best friends, after all. Jon loved her, but it still stung to not be good enough.

He put the water on to boil and picked up his book, methodically dog-earing the pages he hoped to return to in the next meeting. Maybe he could send page references to the group chat, make sure they had the background knowledge necessary, he mused, opening a packet of linguini.

Georgie’s keys rattled in the door just as the linguini was ready. Jon didn’t greet her, just handed her the fork to taste test.

“Perfect,” she said. “Al dente.”

Jon smiled, and began to lay the table, trying not to eavesdrop on the quiet conversation between Melanie and Georgie. Melanie proved to be gracious enough, complimenting the Dolmio sauce, and wordlessly cleared up the plates once everyone had finished.

“How did today go? What are your research assistants like?” Georgie leaned over the table, giving him a slightly wavering smile.

“They’re fine,” he replied, closing his eyes. “Martin is skittish and Tim is annoying. They’re both Anthropology students, so I’m a little worried about how suited their skillsets are to the project. And I hope no _personal relationships_ of theirs become an interference. But I can’t complain.”

Jon opened his eyes again, fixing Georgie with an unspoken question. She seemed to falter under his gaze, which made him want to scream for all sorts of different reasons.

“Is it alright with you if Melanie stays for a bit?” she asked, finally.

Jon looked to the closed kitchen door and the sounds of clattering dishes and a quiet, unselfconscious humming. He nodded. He couldn’t exactly say no.

-

 **New group**  
Sasha James: Hey guys!!! Hope you’re all well. Found an article on street violence in Alexandria if you’re interested. Not essential obviously but a useful contextualisation of the era :)  
_Sasha James changed the group name to_ **Serapeum research project**  
+44—[tim]: i love extra reading sasha. especially at 1AM  
Sasha James: It’s 1am? Damn. Didn’t even realise  
+44—[tim]: go to bed  
_+44—[tim] changed the group name to_ **the SerapeOPLE**  
Sasha James: Nice  
+44— [Martin Blackwood]: Nice  
+44—[tim]: Nice

-

It seemed Martin’s early arrival the other day wasn’t just for first impressions’ sake, as, when Jon headed over to the seminar room for their next meeting, he was already there.

He hadn’t noticed Jon, and so he allowed himself an indulgent moment to watch. Peoplewatching was his favourite pastime; a lot of what he did was to try and understand other people. Maybe that’s just what every human being set out to do, in a desperate thirst for authentic behaviour.

Martin looked different today, and Jon realised it was because his hair had been spared from the rain, and was much lighter than he had thought; a sort of strawberry blond, thick and wavy and untamed. He’d tucked it behind his ears, which were red-tipped, perhaps with the warmth of the room, and today he wore reading glasses. With one hand on a forgotten mug of something steaming, he poured over a slim paperback. Completely absorbed.

Jon cleared his throat, then regretted it, as Martin’s forehead immediately creased.

“What are you reading?” Jon demanded, interrupting Martin’s attempt at a greeting.

“Oh, uh, sorry. It’s just an Orwell. For an essay. Um…” He neatly replaced the bookmark and pressed it down on the table, not quite meeting Jon’s eyes.

“Have you done the contextual reading?”

“Of course I have,” said Martin.

Jon took the opposite chair and opened his laptop, trawling through notes he’d made on a PDF before coming. They were silent. He was hyperaware of Martin’s presence, and it was irritating, having the sounds and movements of another person in your peripheral, especially when you were trying to mentally corroborate pagan accounts of Pope Theophilus of Alexandria’s influence on the Serapeum. 

Martin had an annoying habit of twisting his ring around, clockwise and then anticlockwise. He would repeat this motion several times every minute and occasionally get stuck in a loop. Jon looked at his watch. Another ten minutes before Sasha was due, and he couldn’t stand it any longer.

“Interesting ring,” he remarked pointedly.

“Oh, yeah, thanks. It’s a Roman coin,” Martin said.

“Hmm. Stripping the artefacts of ancient civilisations for tacky souvenirs.” Martin just pressed his lips together in response. It occurred to Jon belatedly that that perhaps wasn’t the proper conduct towards students giving up their time to assist his project. But it stopped Martin from fiddling, at least, and Jon could finally concentrate.

Sasha and Tim’s chatter was audible before they even opened the door. Jon was distinctly not in the mood. Not in the mood, not in the mood, not in the mood. The atmosphere at home was awkward, and that paired with another poor night’s sleep and his racing thoughts that he just COULDN’T push aside made his head _tight._ Tight enough to snap.

“You alright?” Jon hadn’t realised his eyes were closed until Sasha was gently nudging him. Her gaze was filled with a generosity that confused him. She barely knew him, he made sure of that; their acquaintance was purely academic, their conversations enthusiastic but deliberately impersonal. Yet he was accustomed to her company, and apparently that went two ways. Enough for her to pick up on his moods.

He didn’t reply.

She pushed a piece of paper towards him. “Check this out. It’s referencing a document about Emperor Theodosius I. But the document is carbon dated centuries before he was even born.”

“ _Oh,_ ” said Jon, peering at the highlighted text. “That’s quite odd.”

“Must be a mistake or something.” Jon finally met her eyes, and they were flickering with intensity. Tim and Martin had stopped in their small talk and were listening in.

“Must be,” he repeated, but noted down the articles anyway. It snapped him out of his stupor enough to greet everyone and push forward with their meeting.

“Right, so obviously you all have your focuses, and I’ll let you get on in a minute, but Professor Bouchard is asking for an outline of our progress so far. So, if we just spend a bit of time at the beginning of each meeting sharing key findings, the main debates, etcetera. Anything overlooked in the academic journals that could provide an interesting focus.”

And this was what worked. None of Sasha’s frightening intensity, or Tim’s obnoxious jokes, or Martin fiddling with that _fucking_ ring. Just nice, digestible academic debate. No women sleeping on his sofa. Jon found he preferred people when they were long-dead and placed out on a page for him to analyse.

-

_ebouchard@bham.ac.uk_  
Jon,  
Thank you for the notes. Received. Your progress seems satisfactory.  
Per your query about misprints of dates, I was not aware this was an issue in any publications about the Serapeum. This is likely a minor mistake, and I would encourage you to focus on more productive foci.  
I have been having some technical issues lately so would appreciate future hand ins printed out and in my pigeonhole. I presume this will not be an issue. Also, I would like to remind you that you are yet to collect the feedback for your preliminary essay on the Serapeum’s religious conflict. Please consult my office hours.  
Regards, Elias.

-

Jon really didn’t want to collect his preliminary essay on the Serapeum’s religious conflict, so instead he was asleep on one of the desks in the Social Sciences library.

He’d found a peaceful corner, unlikely to be disturbed. It was underneath one of the latched windows, which rattled in the rising wind. Shortly before falling into a slumber, he’d been staring at it miserably, dreading the cycle home. Sleeping in the Social Sciences library was definitely just prolonging all of his issues.

In the second hour of his nap, he was stirred awake by the prickling sense of somebody watching him. 

“Hmph?” he questioned, fumbling for his glasses. Sure enough, a figure across the desk came into focus. She was scary and scowling, with cropped hair and a sour mouth and an array of rings that looked unsettlingly like knuckle dusters.

And, sure enough, her eyes were fixed on him.

“Hello?” he prompted.

“Are you one of Professor Bouchard’s students?” Her voice was even and calm, with a distinct Welsh accent. It was strangely soothing.

“Uh, he’s my supervisor, I guess?”

“What are you doing?”

“I mean, I was sleeping. Until. Um.” Jon wondered how long she’d been watching him, that unhidden suspicion creasing her forehead.

“I’m going now,” she informed him neutrally. Jon just blinked as she left, still trying to wake up. His life was becoming slightly more odd; not in any meaningful capacity, but in the mundane oddities that came with new acquaintances.

When another figure sat down in exactly the same chair, he had to do a double take. It was Tim, regarding him with amused curiosity.

“Hey there, Jon. When was the last time you moved?” He continued before Jon could even open his mouth. “Since our meeting, I’ve had two lectures, a lunch date, been on a run, and rung my mum. And. You’re still here.”

“I’m so glad to hear how much more fulfilling your life is,” said Jon dryly, and Tim cackled. He didn’t expect Tim to laugh like that.

“Seriously. I’m asking if you’re alright.”

“I’m fine, just a little ruffled.” Tim’s attention was elsewhere already, his restless energy zeroing in on the piece of paper under Jon’s elbow. He snatched it, studying the highlighted printout.

“Sasha left it,” said Jon, scrabbling to defend himself, although he wasn’t sure why. “A historical account apparently made way before the events even happened. I’m sure there’s a perfectly rational explanation, but…”

“But,” said Tim, in a way that indicated he _understood_. He shared that nose for mysteries.

They sat there in silence for some time.

“Tea?” Jon asked, finally. “I have a flask. Forgot about it.”

“We’re not allowed drinks in the library,” said Tim with an expression of mischievous delight.

“Well, try not to spill it on any books, then. Or do. I’m not inclined to discuss finances, especially for my grant, but the university might somewhat deserve it. Tight bastards.”

Tim laughed again, with absolute _glee._ “I’m alright, thanks. I just came to check out some books. Are you ever planning on leaving?”

“When the wind dies down.”

“How are you getting home?”

“Cycling.”

“Oh my God.” Tim frowned at the wind rattling the window. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Jon, but if you go out in that you might literally blow away. C’mon. I’ll drive you.”

Tim didn’t leave much room for argument. He was, again, strange. Not because he was untrustworthy, rather the opposite; Jon found himself trusting him easily, and slipping into casual conversation, and smiling once or twice. Tim was _nice._ Jon wasn’t used to this. Jon didn’t even remember the last time he made a friend.

Tim was kind, too, and stubborn and interesting. He insisted Jon shoved his bike in the back of his car, not caring about mud. That was when Jon began to understand why Sasha spent time with him. He joked about the state of the car, seemingly not embarrassed about the coffee cups and magazines and shopping bags and takeaway boxes. That was when Jon began to understand how he made conversation feel effortless. Then, he told Jon a rambling story about the car being a joint present to him and his brother, Danny, only their parents didn’t get it until after Tim had moved out, and so he only really got to use it when he was home or Danny was busy with A Levels, and this was all a massive conspiracy against him and blatant discrimination against older siblings. And, finally, Jon understood why everyone liked Tim, because he found himself beginning to like Tim, too.

“Hey, did you see anyone loitering around when you came into the library?”

Tim hummed. “Yeah, actually. Scary-looking girl. Short hair, shaved, I think. She sort of—strode out of your little cranny. Made me jump.”

“Yes, that’s the one! She was weird. She spoke to me.”

Tim gave him a sideways look. “She spoke to you? Most irregular. She must be extremely weird.”

Jon was aware of being teased, but they were approaching his street. “Here’s fine. Thank you for the lift.”

“No problem, boss,” said Tim, giving a little salute.

Jon rolled his eyes. “I’m not your—” he stammered, but Tim was already driving away.

-

 **The serapeOPLE**  
Tim Stoker: official verdict on jon? he’s cool. he’s fine  
Martin Blackwood: Okay ??  
Tim Stoker: oh vibes i thought i was PMing sasha but hi there  
Tim Stoker: also i’m pissed  
Tim Stoker: friday night MOTIVE  
Tim Stoker: martin come join me on pub crawl. my treat  
Tim Stoker: oh vibes i thought i was PMing martinnn. again. you can all come. like i said--------- my treat ;)  
Sasha James: Free drinks? That a promise?  
Tim Stoker: anything for you  
Tim Stoker: whoops. lets play that one off as a joke  
Martin Blackwood: Jesus Christ :///  
Tim Stoker: martin! cobbler’s arms! now!  
Tim Stoker: if we don’t have a group piss up by the end of term then what’s the fucking point  
Jon Sims: The point is C.V. experience and academic fulfilment.  
Tim Stoker: it speaaaaaaaaaaaakkkkkkkkkks  
Martin Blackwood: Hi Jon  
Tim Stoker: Hi Jon  
Sasha James: Hi Jon  
Tim Stoker: Hi Jon  
Sasha James: Hi Jon  
Tim Stoker: Jon. Jon. i have something to say  
Tim Stoker: …  
Tim Stoker: Hi  
Martin Blackwood: Tim.

-

Oddly enough, Jon saw the scary woman again that following Friday. And, like all the other scary women in his life, it was over pints with Georgie and their new roommate Melanie.

Conversations with Melanie had been somewhat strained. She just made him feel—weird, to be honest, and he justified to himself that anyone would feel weird with a stranger living in their house. But the weirdest part was she was rapidly becoming less than a stranger. They would eat breakfast together in silence, make each other cups of tea when a pot was going, and he even (reluctantly) lent her his laptop once. It was uncomfortably intimate for someone he knew nothing about.

Neither Melanie nor Georgie had bothered to tell him why Melanie had to live in their flat. Jon had concluded that she was definitely not a student, and this paranormal investigator schtick may actually be her full-time job, but his detective skills hadn’t got him any further. It was annoying. He didn’t like not knowing things.

Melanie did seem to be acquainted with most of Georgie’s friends, and blended with them seamlessly. Like birds of a feather. In direct contrast, Jon _hated_ these situations and only ever really came out so Georgie wouldn’t worry. He was just about to make his excuses and go home to his work when a vaguely familiar face approached.

She was with another woman: tall, stern-looking, wearing a hijab. Jon noticed that neither of them had drinks. It seemed they had arranged to meet someone in the outskirts of the group and began a hushed conversation before being invited to join the crowded table. The group shuffled along for them without complaint, shifting beer mats and drinks over the aged wood that was supposed to look ‘authentic’.

“Who’s that?” he beckoned Georgie and hissed in her ear.

“Who, Basira and Daisy? They’re criminal psych students. Why, do you fancy them?”

Georgie always said stuff like that, and it kind of made Jon feel like shit. “No, I don’t fancy them as a collective, nor do I fancy either of them as individuals,” he said snidely.

Georgie was unperturbed. “Oh, shame. They’re cool. You’ve probably seen them around the social sciences building.”

Jon grunted, letting the chatter and white noise of the pub wash over him. A pint or two later, and Jon decided to confront her, his thoughts beginning to fuzz pleasantly around the edges. 

“Hey,” he said, grinning slightly.

She regarded him coolly. “Hey.”

“Daisy, right? I’m Jon.”

“Jon. Good to meet you.” She blinked at him, and it was a clearly a prompt, a non-verbal ‘can I help you?”

Jon didn’t really know what to say next. He didn’t know why the library encounter had bothered him so much, and he didn’t know why he felt compelled to confront her, and he didn’t really know all that much about _anything._ Which was kind of hilarious. So, he said the first thing that came to his slightly addled brain. “Have you ever considered doing audiobooks? You have a really nice voice.”

“Are you trying to come on to me?” she snapped, and her friend whipped around, poised to defend.

Jon considered this, his thoughts to sluggish to register the matching glare they were both giving him. Was he trying to come on to her? “No. Definitely not. It was just a genuine, like, thought. And I wanted to share it.”

“Okay.” She frowned. “Good.”

They frowned at each other for a few more moments. Even in the soft light of the pub, her face was hardened, and she sat with a loaded purpose, perfectly balanced and yet poised to spring at any provocation. Her forearm was placed deliberately on the table, assuming a statue of casual openness that was most definitely forced. She hadn’t touched any drink since arriving, and half of her attention seemed turned to Basira, keenly attentive at all times. Like a watchdog.

After Daisy’s outburst, Basira kept glancing at him too, not hiding the flickers of suspicion. She, too, was strung like a puppet, body language arranged in a performance of ease that unnerved him. They were just normal students, but in stark contrast to the openness of Georgie’s friends, they made a formidable pair.

“Is Elias Bouchard your supervisor?” Basira said, her voice clear as she directed it above the chatter of the table.

“Yes.” Jon frowned, confused by her interruption, and turned back to Daisy. “Um, I was meaning to ask. Why were you watching me sleep in the library?”

“Keep your eye on that Bouchard.” It was framed as a response, but Jon found it just left him with more questions. Basira was nodding her agreement, easing herself closer to Daisy. He felt weirdly trapped.

“Why?”

“There’s something about him that doesn’t sit right. He teaches a few of our classes. He’s just suspicious, he’s all wrong. He’s planning something,” Daisy explained, as if this was the logical conclusion.

Either Jon was more drunk than he thought, and seriously misinterpreting her, or she was just a bit unhinged. “I mean, he’s a bit creepy, and I don’t exactly like him, but I don’t think he’s planning something.”

“Trust. He’s weird. His whole thing is weird.” She said this with such assurance that, for a moment, Jon was drawn in.

“I’m doing this research project under him, and yeah, I suppose some weird things have been happening,” he said, conversationally. “Like, all of a sudden, I keep meeting all these new people. And they all insist on… inserting themselves into my life.”

“I see why that’s hard to adjust to,” Basira remarked, so quietly that Jon thought he’d misheard. Funnily enough, Jon believed her.

“Thank you.” They met eyes, and Basira’s mouth twitched upwards for a fraction of a second. He turned to address Daisy. “That’s you included. First you stare at me creepily while I nap and now, you’re in my pub.”

“Not your pub,” Daisy said.

He blinked. “You know what I’m saying.”

“Yes, and I’m saying it’s not technically your pub.”

Jon sighed. “And there’s this…thing that keeps niggling on my mind. A perfect, detailed historical account. Only the event its documenting happened centuries after it was originally written.”

Daisy just looked at him curiously. Letting him speak, and be heard.

“There’s a rational explanation, I know, I know. The data’s wrong, they’ve muddled up their BCs and ADs, etcetera etcetera. But sometimes these things stick in the inside of your brain and there’s no escaping them.”

“Especially when you start gushing about them in the pub.”

“It’s only appropriate,” Jon laughed.

Basira nudged her, then turned away. In response, Daisy shifted her body weight slightly, subtly, so all her attention was on him. The expression on her face was…disarmingly considerate. And surprising. _Certainly_ surprising. “Why don’t I drop by and give the research a once-over? Outsider’s perspective. Fresh pair of eyes. That might stop you from worrying.”

Jon was stunned into silence. Daisy just stared at him until he nodded.

“Don’t know how to solve the other thing, though.”

Jon scrambled for something to say, a way to thank her. “I appreciate it. Seriously. And nobody knows how to fix that sort of thing.”

“I’m sure someone does,” she mused. “The ones who say they’re a ‘people person’. The social butterflies, they have all the answers. Maybe it’s not all so bad?”

“Really?” On some level, she seemed to _understand_. Or maybe that was just a trick of Jon’s tipsy, lonely heart.

“Maybe there’s room in your life for more people?”

Jon watched Melanie and Georgie, not discreetly. Georgie had an arm round her, and they were both pink-faced, giggling into each others’ shoulders. Melanie leaned over Georgie to check a text, and turned the screen to her, prompting another round of secret giggles. They were like one; they were completely oblivious to anything that wasn’t each other.

Jon watched them, and ached, and ached, and ached.

-

 **The SerapeOPLE**  
Jon Sims: I have booked the seminar room from 2PM to 11PM. Please utilise it as an office space. It isn’t essential to attend, only useful, so we can work together.  
Tim Stoker: HYPE HOUSE  
Martin Blackwood: Thanks Jon  
Tim Stoker: Thanks Jon  
Martin Blackwood: Tim.  
Sasha James: Thanks Jon  
Sasha James: Fr though. Cheers. Can’t wait to get REASEARCHING  
Tim Stoker: HELL YES

-

There was another one.

In a book, the feeling of pages between his fingers making it seem all the more real. Tim had spotted this one. And yes, misprints happened. This whole thing was just—a massive misprint.

Still, he found himself searching up the references. Following up on all the sources. Unconsciously, hands flying across the keyboard, eyes glazing over every detail. Details that suggested, definitively, something impossible—

The people of the Serapeum were recording historical events before they even happened.

-

It was approaching 10PM. Everybody had stayed longer than he had expected; but Sasha was having a film night with roommates, and Tim had rehearsal for drama soc. They both promised to be in contact if they found anything else. Jon had barely registered it. He was scrolling through JSTOR, reading and reading and reading until his eyes stung.

“Do you want a cup of tea?” said Martin, and Jon closed his eyes, the numbness rushing over him like a wave. Words swam in the darkness, illuminated by horrible blue light, ducking and diving and evading him, and it was NAUSEATING.

A minute passed. Martin tried again. “Jon? Cup of tea?”

He gasped out a breath. “Yes. Sorry. Yes please.”

He followed Martin to the kitchen, feeling a little dumbstruck still. While Martin filled the kettle and hunted for the least grimy mugs, he hopped onto the counter, swinging his legs uselessly.

“How’s your Orwell?”

The kitchen area was dimly-lit, the single lightbulb fighting to illuminate Martin’s face in faint yellow. He was watching Jon with an otherworldly patience, watching him like weathering a storm. His stomach lurched, suddenly dizzy from the shadows and the eyes of another person.

“Oh. It was only a reread. The essay went well, though,” Martin replied. The kettle began to rattle, violently, like it was about to break. With Martin’s attention elsewhere, Jon squeezed his eyes shut, and gently banged his head against a cupboard.

“Good. Good,” said Jon, but he said it like it meant ‘sorry’. “Why do you…reread books?”

“What do you mean? Why wouldn’t I?” After pouring the tea, Martin settled himself into the cranny opposite, and regarded Jon with his blinking and restless eyes.

“Well. Why read something if you already know it all? Already know the ending?”

“Have you never reread a book?” Jon shook his head. “W-well. What about when you really love a book? And you can relive it all, it’s like a comfort. Yeah, the plot’s familiar, and you know what’s coming, but sometimes that’s nice. It’s like…it’s like, singing along to a song. Also, you notice more things the second time round. Which is useful. From an English Lit standpoint.”

The silence between them stretched, and Jon watched Martin carefully as he frowned and dodged eye-contact. All Jon could hear was the dormant appliances, and with each thrum of electricity he turned this new information around in his brain, considering how rereading novels _could_ be comforting. 

He realised absently that he’d been forgetting to blink, and tried to rectify that fact.

Martin finally continued. “I don’t think any of that applies when obsessively rereading articles.”

Jon laughed dryly. “I think you might be right. It’s just…weird, is all. Very weird.” His hands were _shaking_ , and he looked down at them like they didn’t belong to him. “Do you mind if I smoke?”

“Just open the window.” Jon felt weirdly smug with his assistant’s disregard for university rules. He even offered Martin one, generously, but he declined.

“How do you take it?”

“Black, one sugar, please.” It took him several tries to light his cigarette. Martin just waited, mug in hand, until it was firmly between his lips and he could take a greedy inhale.

“Here,” said Martin, pressing the tea into Jon’s hands. The seeping warmth began to thaw his hands. He hadn’t even noticed how cold he was, bringing the mug to his cheek to let it rest.

This was weird. This stiff, stilted politeness between them.

He took the cigarette away from his mouth, flicking the ash. “Thank you.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.” Jon didn’t know what was going on in his head, and he didn’t exactly want to try and untangle it with Martin. “Can you just…talk? About anything that isn’t archaeology?”

Martin flushed with the sudden attention, meeting Jon’s eyes with a deer-in-headlights expression. He had to suppress a scoff. “Like…like what?”

Jon took a drag of his cigarette, tucking his legs under him. “Books you like. I don’t know. Books you reread.”

“Okay.” Martin began to smile, slowly, gently. “Okay, then.”

-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> when i wrote melanie's first scene all i could think about was nikki blonsky's twitter bio that's like. nikki blonsky: paranormal investigator. this had me in literal hysterics and i dont know why
> 
> thank you so very much for reading, i really hope you enjoyed it!!! next instalment will be shortly because miss rona has cancelled my A Levels and i have nothing to do. i hope you're all staying safe and responsible, and taking care of yourselves. i appreciate you giving this a read xxx


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jon has maybe possibly uncovered a massive conspiracy. He's trying not to think about it, but Sasha and Martin have other ideas.
> 
> Meanwhile, he worries he's being stalked (no, actually, Daisy is just like that), is an ignorant bastard, and then apologises. All of this would be far easier if he got a good night's sleep, but that's never an option when...you know...you've maybe possibly uncovered a massive conspiracy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there are three verbatim quotes from shakespeare's twelfth night here (aka the 2nd funniest play ever written). only two were on purpose. your challenge today is to spot them xx

Jon was, honest to God, trying to relax. To any observer, his relaxation habits wouldn’t seem conventional nor entirely useful; all the windows to his room were thrown open, curtains flapping in the bitter wind, and a bowl of noodles was balanced on his chest as he sprawled on dirty sheets like a decadent Roman. He was neglecting his meagre dinner, opting instead to chain-smoke and try to switch his brain off.

When his phone rang, he splashed the duvet with broth, twisting to check who it was. An unknown number. It was probably a cold caller, so he ignored it, pressing his cheek against his pillow miserably.

Okay, so maybe this wasn’t self-care. Self-care was Georgie’s freaky face masks and meditation and all sorts of stuff that Jon knew he would hate. Maybe he was _wallowing_.

His phone rang again. Persistent cold-caller, he thought. He could imagine them on the other end of the line, holed up in an office or pouring over a computer, being yelled at or ignored by everyone they called. That sounded _bleak_. Maybe it was that thought that spurred him to answer the phone.

“Hello.” To his confusion, it was Daisy’s voice that responded.

“Evening.”

“I don’t—” Jon blinked. “Why do you have my number?” Maybe he had a stalker. Maybe Daisy was his stalker and was plotting to murder him violently in the woods somewhere.

“You gave it to me in the pub, remember?” she explained impatiently. “Anyway—"

“I don’t remember that. I don’t remember doing that at all.”

“Jon, I don’t care. Basira and I were wondering if we can…um, if you still want us to take a look at your…freaky prophecy shit. To confirm whether or not you’re going insane.”

Jon swallowed, replaying this phrase in his head. “You think…you think it’s like a prophecy?”

“God. Don’t start spiralling on me again. Is Wednesday good for you? 2PM?”

“Yes, sure. Whatever. We meet in—"

“We’ll find you,” she said ominously, and hung up. Jon exhaled. The lengths she went to sound intimidating were somewhat absurd, and it had to be some kind of act, some pretend closedness. He couldn’t figure out why.

He’d considered the prophecy angle, of course. He’d considered EVERY angle; his brain had spent hours turning all the information over and over until it aligned in various ways. But that was ridiculous. That was the irrational, impossible, childish stuff of fiction.

But he understood why she’d said compared it a prophecy. Even if she was joking; that is, if Daisy was capable of jokes. Jon was sure that if some randomer had rambled to him in the pub about it, then he’d have jumped to the same conclusions. She didn’t even know there was _more_ evidence. 

Oh, he was definitely spiralling now, he thought, squashing his cigarette butt on the plate on his bedside table. Georgie would think that that was disgusting, but the petty, spiteful teenager in him deliberately didn’t care. His noodles were fucking cold. 

When she knocked on his door, he jumped, starting to hide the makeshift ashtray before realising that was ridiculous and he was an adult.

“Uh, Sasha’s here to see you. Can she come in or are you, um,” she swept a critical eye over Jon’s current state of ramshackle, “busy?”

Jon leapt up to arrange himself at his desk, shoving the noodles under some loose paper. “No, that’s absolutely fine. That’d be great. Thank you. Georgie.”

“Yeah. No problem,” she muttered, and if Jon didn’t know any better, he’d say her tone was _bitter_. About what? What now? God, that just piled on more anxieties. At least he was never bored. 

Sasha hesitantly stepped into the doorway, offering up a small smile. She was wearing her usual cardigan, long and chunky and petrol blue. Her hair was messy, the flyaway strands seeming to defy gravity, but it still suited her. Behind square glasses, she blinked at him through the smoke that Jon knew was lingering in the room. He noticed her eyes had dark shadows beneath them.

He slumped, breaking the tense performance of functionality. “I’m sorry about the smell. It’s a bad habit.”

“That’s okay.” She was uncharacteristically quiet.

“Um, do you want to sit down? Take my chair.” He leapt up awkwardly and tried in vain to fan some smoke out of the window. She smiled her thanks, taking in the disarray of his desk, her eyes lingering on the photos propped up against books, and the CDs lined against the wall.

“Pulp. Nice.” Her voice was flat.

“Yeah. They’re great. Different Class is a classic.” Jon tried to assume a casual position on the edge of his bed, but his limbs were stiff. It was weird, having someone in his room, thumbing through his CDs with eyes that didn’t quite want to meet him.

A thought occurred. “How did you find out where I live?”

“Oh. Tim told me the street. And I knew you lived with Georgie, so I did a little digging. It was fairly easy.” She laughed, self-conscious, although a little bit of her usual irony and brightness crept back into her voice. “You must think I’m a right stalker.”

“I think I’d be a very boring person to stalk.” He would _definitely_ be a boring person to stalk. She hummed, leaning on the desk, her elbow edging towards—“Oh, Sasha, mind the bowl—”

Her elbow edged towards the pile of paper, knocking the noodles. The bowl wobbled, in almost slow motion, and then upturned, spilling the noodles all over the wooden floor. They landed with a distinct, almost comical “splat”, and oozed there pathetically, glistening in the low light.

A beat. Jon caught Sasha’s eye, and they both burst out laughing.

“Fuck, Jon, I’m so sorry,” she said, although its sincerity was somewhat undermined by her uncontrollable giggling. He was laughing too hard to even reply. Something about—the randomness of Sasha stalking him, and the pathetic moping state he’d been in, and his overtired brain processing the broth now trickling into the floorboards…it was hysterical.

“I’ll…I’ll grab the dustpan and brush,” he managed, struggling for any semblance of composure. Sasha just nodded, laughing even harder, until tears were pricking the corners of her eyes.

When they both finally regained their breath, Sasha was very gracious about it. She cleared up the whole mess, scrubbing miso broth off his floorboards methodically. Apparently unphased, she then suggested they take their conversation somewhere where she could buy him dinner.

-

The city had a generous selection of fast-food places, and Jon, his hatred for cooking generally trumping his high standards, was familiar with almost all of them. Sasha had remarkably good taste; she suggested an out of the way kebab shop that struck the perfect balance between affordable for students and unlikely to give you food poisoning.

He ordered a chip pitta with roasted vegetables, and Sasha was polite enough not to ask why anyone would voluntarily get vegetables from a kebab shop. She turned out to be a much better dinner companion than Georgie, on account of not once mentioning Hungarian food, and even offering him some of her kebab.

“Oh, no thanks. I’m vegetarian.”

“Oh, shit!” Her eyes flickered to the mushroom he was stabbing. “Jon, you should’ve said, I would have suggested somewhere else.”

“No, it’s perfectly fine. I love a pitta.” He meant it, too, but Sasha didn’t seem convinced. “Anyway. What did you want to talk about?”

“You mean, why did I harass Tim for your address and turn up on your doorstep unannounced?” She smiled, twisted with a bitter self-irony. “Mostly I was just worried. About you, of course, but also about…all of this. The, um, you know.”

“Daisy called them prophecies.” It was intended as a joke, but it didn’t land.

Sasha frowned. “I suppose they are, a bit. Well, they’ve been niggling the back of my mind, and I found I struggled to do any… relevant research, cos I just kept thinking. It’s a strange mistake to make twice. So, I had more of a look and found this article.”

She dug around in her backpack to produce a neatly stapled bit of paper. Jon knew how Sasha worked; she digitised as much as possible, all of her references were on her laptop desktop, and whenever she had to print, she scribbled ideas in biro until it was barely readable. 

This was completely untouched. She had even put it in a laminate folder. The seriousness sunk in Jon’s stomach like a stone.

He pulled it across the grimy booth, taking a closer look. It was about eyes.

“Found it bookmarked on Elias’ computer,” she boasted.

“Sasha! Oh my god!”

“What?” Her face was arranged in an expression of innocence, but the laughter danced in her dark eyes. It looked like it belonged there. Sasha was always laughing.

“You can’t just hack into people’s computers. Jesus Christ.”

“Actually, Jon, evidence would suggest I can. Because I just did.” She leaned over eagerly, just far enough into his personal space that he was a little uncomfortable. She was proud of herself, and Jon equally admired and feared her tenacity. “Give it a read.”

Obediently, he skimmed over the analysis of eye motifs in Alexandria, until he found a section on the Serapeum, referencing two very familiar statements, among some others.

“These are…”

“Our ones, yeah. What I want to know, is why Elias dismissed it when he’s been, well, either he’s been doing his own research—”

“Or he already knew,” Jon said, realisation slowly dawning. His mind began to race, collecting together all of his impressions and his suspicions; Daisy’s mistrust of Elias, his reluctance to communicate electronically, his detachment from their research. It didn’t make sense.

“Exactly!” Sasha slapped the table, jolting him back to reality. The kebab shop was all but empty, and all of the mundane details were suddenly apparent. The hiss of the fryer, the chatter of the employees, the dull red walls, all seemed otherworldly. He struggled to reconcile the ordinary with what felt like—this _revelation_ they shared. 

“What do we do now?” He was conscious of the tremor in his own voice.

“You tell me. It’s your research project.”

He picked up and examined a cold chip, soggy with vinegar. “Somehow, it—it feels like more than that.”

And that was the moment they were hooked.

-

Jon went home and pinned the article to his wall. Sasha assured him she had another copy. Multiple other copies.

He didn’t sleep that night, nor did he the night after. But he couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so alive. It was the joy of new discovery that had drawn him to academia, and now it felt like _coming home_. The dissection of articles and analysis of sources and the never-ending puzzling of his feverish mind was an old delight.

The third night, he did sleep, and it was fitful. He dreamed of the eyes printed all over Sasha’s article, but by the time he blinked awake with a stiff neck at 4 in the morning, the image had already faded from his subconscious.

Georgie used to say he was obsessive. He felt meaningful, he felt like obsession wasn’t a bad thing, like it never could be.

On the fourth day, he organised a meeting with the rest of them, the crick in his neck making him tense. When Martin misplaced a translation, his vision swum, and he snapped at the fumbling man.

That night, he dreamt of their tea in the kitchen, and when Martin rambled about his favourite books, his eyes seemed brighter than usual. No, more than that. They were glowing.

He remembered that dream. He snapped at Martin again, the memories of such casual vulnerability making him prickle.

It was going to take a long time, he knew that, he wasn’t stupid. He was practical. He knew he had to avoid burning out, he saw himself as a tool that needed to be sharp. The task felt like his. He took pleasure in these restless nights, and a life that was more than other people’s gestures and undecipherable existence. He had something to solve.

Was there an end? Maybe he didn’t mind either way.

-

The Serapeum: thread  
 _Opening a thread about the Serapeum of Alexandria, sister of the infamous library . Accounts of the geography and sociology of the pagan city highlight it as a haven of underground activity; spared from the scrutiny of Christian authorities, while holding a formidable amount of contemporary literature. See its role as the last pagan stronghold in the city .  
Evidence suggests that it was the base of a secret society. The more reactionary and predominantly Christian accounts famously accuse the people of the Serapeum of blood sacrifices and pagan rituals . There are less reliable, often incomplete, civilian accounts imply the inner workings of the Serapeum were hidden from the public, and this is argued to be indicative of Alexandrian standards of confidentiality and the great respect the library and its associated bodies were held with .  
But perhaps this secrecy also applied to the levels of control within the Serapeum; so, our sources which reveal the library’s funding, systems of collection, permissions, etcetera, can not be confirmed to know every detail of the Serapeum unless they were on the highest level of command. To use a modern analogy; in large companies nobody knows exactly the inner workings apart from the CEO, and there are no contemporary sources of the Serapeum’s figurative CEO. A secret society cannot be disproved.  
Equally, it can’t be proved. But the Serapeum received visits from notable figures, a number of them part of pagan resistance organisations . It is impossible to identify any pattern from these visits, but significantly several patrons were the inspiration for the rumours of rituals , including the woman known simply as ‘Hathor’, whose well-preserved diaries and disappearance after the Kitos War suggest proto-voodoo rituals were performed on Lukuas and his army; most intriguingly, the gory fate of a regiment of soldiers suggests these rituals were successful.   
Now compare this to discrepancies in the records of contemporary sources. The volume of sources attached to this era means that this is an often-overlooked detail. Yet, there are a significant number of documents describing historical events in great detail, but the carbon dating method applied to them places them before the events they describe happened. Most baffling is this document describing the pagan’s last stand in the Serapeum ; and the results of a carbon dating put this artefact approximately 100 years before the fall of the Alexandria Library . The through line in all this evidence is the Serapeum itself, which provides a perfect base for any pagan secret societies. Perhaps it was ‘Hathor’ and her associates who gave those statements to the Serapeum, predicting future events.  
Beyond the supernatural ties of prophecy and manipulation, nothing can be confirmed about this secret society beyond, I suspect, the motif of the eye. Yes, a common symbol of Egyptian culture, hardly significant to the academic study of Alexandria, but it ties again to the prophetic statements ._

-

He’d forgotten about Daisy and Basira. On the sixth day, they appeared once again.

It was an unusually warm, sunny day; a detail Jon only noticed because his journey had made him so sweaty that his glasses wouldn’t stay on his nose. Tim hadn’t offered him any more lifts, although he noticed that he took Martin if he wasn’t staying late and would usually try to persuade Sasha.

When he walked in, Tim was in the middle of a story, gesticulating wildly while Sasha and Martin laughed themselves into stitches. Papers were scattered on the desk, forgotten, as Sasha wiped tears of laughter from her eyes and Martin clutched his stomach. Tim’s grin was like the cat with the cream.

Then, Martin noticed him in the doorway, and the image froze for a second and then shattered. They all made towards their work stiffly, looking guilty.

“By all means, don’t stop on my account.” Did he sound bitter? He didn’t mean it to sound bitter.

Sasha found his eyes, frowning with sympathy. “Come in, Jon. We’ve been reviewing some translations.”

“Um, I’ve just remembered. I didn’t lock up my bike. I’ll be just a minute.” His stomach was swooping at the way Tim and Martin were whispering, the way they exchanged looks, the way Martin giggled quietly at whatever he’d said.

He was overwhelmed and could deal with this later. He just needed a breather. He wasn’t running away. He wasn’t avoiding anything—he wasn’t— because there was nothing _to_ avoid. 

And, even if he was, that plan was swiftly thwarted when Daisy and Basira materialised in the doorway.

“Afternoon,” said Basira mildly. There was no way to get past them, and they were slowly walking him back into the room.

“Right, well. I suppose my bike can get nicked. Makes no difference to me,” he said between gritted teeth.

“Sarcasm doesn’t suit you,” Daisy remarked, which Jon actually took offence to, because it was one of his more sociable habits.

He sat down at the head of the conference table, the bewildered eyes of his assistants spurring him into action. “Everyone, this is Basira and Daisy. Basira, Daisy, these are my, uh, colleagues for the Serapeum project.”

“Let me guess. Criminal psych?” Tim had his legs on the table again, grinning at them with a smugness that made Jon nervous.

“Yep. How’d you guess?”

“Oh, I know a lot of people of that course.” Probably in the Biblical sense, Jon assumed. 

He let them murmur introductions and niceties, before, gradually but deliberately, turned their faces towards him. Waiting for him to do…something. The expectation of their gazes weighed heavy upon them, so, he decided to cut to the bone.

“I think something weird is going on.” He opened his laptop and spun it around so they could all look. A beat.

“Wow, your brightness is low,” said Martin.

“It’s for my vision,” he protested.

Daisy narrowed her eyes, as if sizing up his laptop screen. “I can’t read that.” 

Jon groaned, adjusting the settings for them. “It’s, like, a deep web conspiracy thread. Nothing academic, no apparent ties to the literature on the Serapeum. It’s probably some randomer in a dark room with red string. But…” he licked his lips, trying to settle his voice into the regular tone of assured authority. It didn’t work. He was nervous. “The sources are well referenced. I had a look, and it traces back to our weird statements.”

Jon watched as every one of their faces was occupied with identical expressions of intent concentration. As if the cogs in their brains were turning. 

Sasha was the first to speak. “So, we’re not the only people to notice something.”

“Exactly. And more than that. There are other people, and they have theories.”

Tim looked to him for permission, then scrolled down the page, to various commenters debating the theories and sharing their own ideas.

“It looks like a few of them were on research projects, sponsored digs, all sorts of stuff in the public eye. And when they took a look at the sources, none of them were able to get approval to publish anything. They’d always get caught up in some sticky legal stuff,” Jon continued.

“Wow. Okay. And look at the date on this. It was posted only a week ago,” Tim said, pointing to a spot on the screen. Jon hadn’t noticed it.

“Is there any way of tracking it?” Basira asked. Wordlessly, Sasha pulled it towards her and began tapping away. They waited with bated breath.

“Nope,” she said at last. “Or at least, no easy way of tracking it. That’s weird. Have you tried to get in contact, Jon?”

Jon shook his head. Sasha began to type furiously in the comments section. Jon just sighed, hoping she at least signed up with her own email, instead of finding his personal account and signing him up to a bunch of stupid newsletters like last time.

Basira pursed her lips with an expression of deep concentration. “I’m not an archaeologist or Egyptologist or historian or whatever. But. Isn’t this basically the illuminati?”

“Yes!” Tim’s exclamation of agreement was worryingly serious. He _couldn’t_ be serious. Surely.

The things the thread theorised were faintly ridiculous, of course. But it was also the only acknowledgement of any strangeness, and the only proof he had that they weren’t all insane; this wasn’t some group hallucination. So, he couldn’t help but cling to it.

“Okay, this is what we’re going to do. We have to check out more statements, especially those associated with the eye. There’s suggestions of a cover-up, so I want us to translate the verbatim statements to get a better idea of the content, and especially if it has anything to do with the pagan’s resistance and whatever…supernatural powers the writer seems to be implying.”

“Right, well, that’s our cue,” said Daisy, gripping Basira’s elbow with a shifting urgency. “We’re off.”

“I’ll give you a call, or something. Sorry we couldn’t be more help, but, this was illuminating.” Basira gave him a parting wave before they both marched off. Jon took a moment to process her words. Did this mean he’d also given her his number in the pub? Wow. Maybe he should’ve tried that sooner. Never had so many women had his phone number.

“Wait.” Jon turned back to Martin, who had been quiet for…basically the whole time. His voice was now reedy with belated alarm. “You want us to translate the statements? From Greek?”

Jon blinked. “It’s really not that hard. Sasha and I have a background in Classics, so we can cover all the difficult tasks. If that’s alright with you, Sasha?”

She nodded, but her eyes were on Tim, who was starting to squirm.

“Right, boss, that sounds really super fun and everything, but I’m going to bounce. I have a lecture. For Anthropology. You know, my subject, which is Anthropology. Who knows, maybe Professor Lukas will be springing an Ancient Greek test on us, with any luck, because that’s definitely a pillar of study in Anthropology. So, yeah, I’ll definitely get back to you on that one.” He sprung out of his seat and was racing out of the room before Jon had a chance to even open his mouth.

“What was that about?” he mused aloud. Sasha and Martin gave him matching looks of incredulity.

“Jon, can we have a word?” Martin blurted. The tips of his ears were red again, but Jon thought it might be more than just the April heat that was making him so flushed.

He nodded silently, and Martin led him to the corridor, shooting Sasha an apologetic look. Jon suddenly felt burningly self-conscious.

The corridor was narrow, and he was doing his best to avoid Martin’s eyes. He arranged himself awkwardly, half-seated, half-leaning on one of the boarded-up windows, which had been whitewashed like the rest of the wall. Martin started to pace, up and down, up and down, beating out an anxious rhythm.

He sighed sharply. “Okay, I’m just going to outright say it. I am feeling extremely out of my depth.”

“Yes, but—” Jon began, but Martin just shook his head like a disappointed parent. Jon swiftly shut up.

“I mean this as nicely as possible, but can you please just…let me speak?” He nodded mutely. Martin hesitated, his mouth open as if trying to force the words out. “You are expecting way too much from me and Tim. We can’t…we don’t even do History or Archaeology or Classics or anything like that. I literally failed GCSE German. I can’t…I don’t think I can do this.”

Martin looked like he was about to cry.

“Yes, but. It’s exactly like Latin, you know, a root language. Surely you have some basic knowledge of the languages from secondary school.”

Martin laughed humourlessly. “You keep assuming things about us without even bothering to learn that you’re wrong. You’ll find I went to a _normal_ school. Actually, quite a good one, I’m just not _privately educated._ And Tim went to an awful school. Where the chances of him getting into a Russel Group uni were, like, 1 in 50. But…”

He deflated, and they finally met eyes. Jon’s words fell flat on his tongue, and he found himself silent under the scrutiny of Martin’s eyes. Green, he noticed. Green and murky and unusual.

“This is _insane_ , Jon. When was the last time you got some sleep?” Martin said, his face a picture of earnest concern. Jon felt himself prickling with shame. It felt like, in the short time they’d spoken, Martin had managed to expose part of Jon he didn’t want being exposed, like he was being dressed down. It felt like a headrush. It was nauseating, it was terrifying, and he just wanted Martin to _shut up._

“I wouldn’t expect you to understand.”

“Understand what?” His voice was whiny, but there was a hard undertone to it that warned Jon to back off. Jon didn’t back off.

“Understand what it means to succeed,” he said cruelly. “To have something that you need to complete, that you’re so passionate about, that it—”

“That it consumes you?” Martin frowned at him carefully.

“Yes! No, well…”

“It’s not healthy.”

Jon’s skin was prickling. “Fuck that. I don’t care, Martin. You wouldn’t understand. You aren’t even listening.”

“I am! I am listening, now!” The words rang like a plea, for something. For attention, for approval. That desperate pitch _hurt_ Jon’s ears.

“You’re not exactly—well. You’re hardworking, Martin. You try. But you’re hardly ever going to be exceptional.”

And then. That was when the blow landed.

“You’re…you’re really confusing, you know.” He spat the word confusing, like it was an insult, like it had turned foul on his tongue. _Confusing,_ like it meant cruel or worthless or unbearable.

Martin let his gaze linger for a second, two seconds longer. Then he just…left. Picked up his bag, said bye to Sasha, and walked calmly out of the building.

Jon had succeeded in pushing away Martin’s scrutiny, but somehow he just felt shit about it. 

-

Private message:

Sasha: Hey Jon, hope you’re okay. I miss you! (Tim is still rooting for that group piss-up if you fancy). I just wanted to check up on you. I get how this kind of thing can be really consuming. But we’re a team and I hope you know you can always reach out to us!! We want you to know we’re here to help in every way possible <3  
Sasha: Also don’t be too harsh on Martin lol  
Jon: Thank you all. It’s appreciated.  
Jon: I’m sorry that you had to hear the incident earlier today. It was very unprofessional of me  
Sasha: Not me you should be apologising to, mate

-

Jon was lying on Melanie’s sofa, drafting and redrafting texts until his head hurt.

When Georgie saw him, she sighed a resigned sigh, like Jon having a crisis on the sofa was just another one of her life’s mundane chores. Which come to think of it, it probably was. “What’s the matter?”

“I’m a wanker.”

“Tell me something I don’t already know,” she teased, good natured.

“I’m being serious, Georgie, I would literally rather write an essay. A whole essay. I would rather have a 3-hour meeting with Professor Bouchard. This is excruciating. I am such a dickhead.” Jon declared dramatically.

Georgie laughed, immediately picking up on his self-parody. “Yes, a dickhead. A massive twat.”

“A self-righteous tosser.”

“A gaping arsehole.”

“A shitstain on the history of human decency.”

“A lily-livered boy.”

“A scullion.”

“An ass-head and a coxcomb and a knave, a thin fac’d knave, a gull.”

Jon was losing his steam, as he always did when Georgie whipped out the Shakespeare. “A fucking…fool.”

Georgie laughed. “Better a witty fool than a foolish wit.”

“Well, I’m glad we’re agreed on all that.” Jon let his whole body slump, voice muffled by the cushions. Maybe he’d feel better if he went through the comments on that thread again, or if he dipped back into his book on eye motifs that wasn’t specifically useful but at least felt like something.

“C’mon, budge up.” Georgie gave him a withering look, but it was softened by a certain fondness. He did so wordlessly. “You’ve been moping a lot lately. I’ve been meaning to bring it up.”

“Rude.” The Admiral was watching coolly from the armchair he claimed. “Look, you’re upsetting the Admiral.”

“I never upset the Admiral,” she responded with wounded pride, nudging his side. He let her, sagging deeper into the sofa with the momentum. “C’mon. Tell me what’s been going on. Why are you a wanker?”

“Because, because, because. I made a few assumptions.”

“Yeah?”

“And I pissed somebody off. Who is helping me. I think. I think I pissed him off.”

“Right. And what are you going to do about it?” she asked, mild and practical.

“Send apology texts.”

“See? No need to mope. You don’t even need my help, you’ve got this.” She nudged his side with her sock, and he kicked her back, letting a smile creep onto his face.

“I suppose. It just feels a little bit—empty. Like, all I can manage is a text. It’s a bit pathetic.”

“Okay.” She turned to face him, her mouth a thin line of determination. It was like how they used to spend hours figuring out things over the kitchen table, puzzling over board games and crime shows and documentaries and, finally, when the sun had set and they were full of cheap wine, they would puzzle over their own lives. They’d analyse all the behaviour Jon was so frequently baffled by, and it felt like it was them against the world.

“Okay?”

“Okay. First of all, can you apologise in person? Is that at all a thing you feel like you could manage?”

“No. God, no.” His skin itched at the thought of that. It would be…to much, far too much.

“Right. That’s fine, Jon, that’s fine, don’t look so horrified. IS there anything you could give them? Buy them a coffee, lunch, flowers?”

“I think that would be quite, um, out of character. You know what I mean? I think it would confuse them more than anything else. I don’t really have much of a relationship with either of them, and that might pull the rug from under them.” Jon thought of how Martin had called him confusing, and it had hurt. And he didn’t know why it hurt so much.

“Okay. I completely get you, that would be too much. Then, I think your instincts are right? A text will be enough.”

“But I don’t know what to put.” He threw his arms up in the air like a woeful toddler, tossing his phone towards Georgie’s end of the sofa. She took that as an invitation and peered at the screen. “It all feels so insincere.” 

“The thing with apologies is, it’s meaningful when the other person means it. Sounds obvious, but…” she frowned. “How long have you been drafting messages?”

Jon really didn’t want to admit it, but Georgie’s glare always snapped him out of his self-pity. “Like, a good hour or so.”

“And you have no ulterior motives here? Right?”

“I mean, Sasha did kind of tell me to…and I do want them to keep on working with me…but yeah. They deserve my apologies.”

“Okay, then. So, you’ve spent an hour or so stressing and called yourself many names about this. I think you mean it. Whatever you write is going to come across as sincere because you are sincere right now.”

She was right, because of course she was. “Thank you, Georgie.”

“Let me read over it first, though. You can never be too certain.” He laughed at that, and in turn she looked pleased with herself, and the smile that they shared felt like nothing was wrong. Jon could see another universe where everything was fine and easy and they still stayed up all night talking through their thoughts and problems, unwinding the tangles of his brain.

Then she eased herself up. “Melanie will be home soon. I should probably—”

Home. “Yeah.”

“—Get going with dinner.”

“Yeah. Of course. Of course.”

-

+44—: Hi Jon hope you’re well. Today got a bit intense. Conspiracy thread was weird. Anyway don’t know how much good it’ll do but we have some access to criminology databases. Can do some quick searches anything else I should know? -Basira  
+44—Oh also. About what you said in the pub. Can confirm you’re not going insane as it seems quite creepy. There is my outsider input. -Basira  
Jon: Thank you, Basira. Sasha did find an article about the eye motif appearing on suspicious statements, oddly in connection to Elias. Don’t know if that’ll help but…  
+44—Connected to Elias in what way? -Basira  
Jon: Found it on his computer.  
+44—Nice. Thanks. -Basira  
Jon: You don’t have to sign your name off every time  
+44—It’s a precaution. You need to know who’s texting you.  
+44—See? That just looks wrong. Going to keep doing it. -Basira  
Jon: Fair enough.

-

Sometimes, on sunny days, Jon would find a public place and just—lie down, for a bit. This prompted quite a few strange looks, but that had never stopped him; it always seemed to happen by accident, and besides, he wasn’t in anybody’s way. 

That particular day, it was early afternoon, and Jon had found a nice spot on the campus green to do some reading and sip a weird iced coffee Tim had recommended. It had way too much milk and not enough coffee, and Jon had remembered he was slightly dairy intolerant just as his stomach began to cramp.

Tim had been very nice about Jon’s apology, and had even struck up a conversation that seemed to meander from state schools and classics to Starbucks orders and the gentrification of London boroughs. Tim knew a lot of things about—everything.

Martin hadn’t replied yet.

Jon had let his eyes slip shut, filtering the sunlight to a faint orange glow. He could feel the warmth fan across his face, just on the right side of burning. It was somehow soothing, and the coffee had made his stomach heavy, and he could let himself just relax, the book balanced on his chest…

He was awoken by a shoe gently prodding his upper arm.

“Mmmph?” he said eloquently. He opened his eyes, and Martin was there, his head covering the sun. The sun lit up his hair like golden flame, like a burning halo. Jon liked that image and turned it over a few times in his head, happily.

“Are you okay, Jon? Are you wearing suncream?”

“Why are you so nice to me?” he said before he could think.

Martin backed away slightly, and Jon had to shade his eyes with a cupped hand to see him. He was backlit by the sun, the curve of his cheek still glowing, his face unreadable and shadowed.

“Did you get my text?” Jon asked quietly. 

“Oh, no I didn’t! No, sorry. I have an essay for Indigenous Cultures due tomorrow, and it counts towards my Anthropology grade for this year and it’s super tricky so, yeah, I’ve kind of been on shutdown. Like, I’ve just been focusing on that. My phone died yesterday, and I’ve been…like, I’m too busy to charge it, you know? And it’s probably a good thing, I mean, I can focus more—"

Jon’s head was spinning, the back of his mouth all hot and dry and tasteless. Martin was speaking so fast and he just couldn’t concentrate, probably from a whole combination of factors, probably because of the sun and his headache and his scratchy lungs and his slight mania.

“Do you like iced coffee?” Jon tried to sit up and had to steady himself as his vision went spotty at the edges. “I am lactose intolerant.”

“Um…” He was still hovering, and the lurching of Jon’s head made it impossible to focus on him.

“I can’t see you, can you sit down, please?”

“Look, Jon, I need to…” Martin made an abortive gesture to leave, his feet shuffling. Jon decided to stare at his feet instead, as they were the only things staying in focus currently. He was wearing trainers that might once have been white. They were all scuffed and faded and green with fresh grass stains. He was wearing odd socks, bright novelty socks. 

“I think I’m going to be sick,” he said matter-of-factly.

“Fucking hell, Jon. Have you had any water today?” He shook his head no, and Martin finally bent to his level, hoisting him up into a sitting position. He arranged himself opposite, legs crossed, rooting in his bag for something.

After some muttered curses, he finally produced a water bottle and handed it to Jon. He unscrewed the top and gulped it, the water spilling down the corners of his mouth. Jon closed his eyes gratefully, although could still feel Martin’s gaze on him.

Once he’d drunk the rest of the bottle, he met the other man’s eyes and held his gaze with determination. “Thank you, Martin. You’re too good to me.”

The hard lines of Martin’s expression melted away, and he smiled, a relieved and bright smile. Then he seemed to remember himself. “I’m pretty sure you have sunstroke, so I don’t trust anything you’re saying right now.”

Jon laughed abruptly, remembering the reason Martin was being so stiff with him. “Um, I have something for you.”

“Oh?” Martin looked…affronted, which wasn’t the reaction Jon had been hoping for. He fished around in his own backpack; and yes, he’d forgotten to bring water, but at least he’d remembered this.

“It’s my favourite book. I liked what you said about rereading books, and this is the only book I dip in and out of. And you’re right, it’s comforting. I want you to read it.”

Martin was silent for far, far too long, and Jon just waited, book outstretched. He wasn’t moving, he was just gaping at the offering.

Jon was starting to squirm. “Check your texts when you get back, yeah? And take a break. If you can. You deserve it.”

“Are you trying to apologise? Is this what this is? A peace offering?” Martin said, his voice incredulous and biting. Jon flinched, withdrawing the book.

“Yes. I’m sorry. I—well, I did send a proper apology text and I thought you’d received it and I’m just not very, I’m just, I’m fucking awful at face to face apologies and I know that’s not an excuse I just, I, I, I—”

“Hey. I didn’t say a peace offering was a bad thing.” Martin indicated Jon to pass the book over, so he could inspect it. “Your favourite book is Memoirs of an Infantry Officer?”

Jon ducked his head, flushing. “Yes.”

“Siegfried Sassoon? You know he’s only famous as a poet, right? His prose is…so dry.”

“I just really like him, okay!” But Martin wasn’t judging him, bring cruel, being accusatory. He was teasing him. Martin was smiling.

“I like him, too. Second favourite war poet. I just never got through Fox-hunting man.”

“This one’s better. Far better, it’s very evocative. More death.”

“Very soothing, I’m sure.” Martin had come closer, through the course of their conversation, and nudged him fondly. Jon’s head span a little bit. “Thank you, Jon. Seriously. And I’ll check my texts when I get home.”

Jon felt light-headed with relief. “Cool. Cool.”

Martin gathered up his things, tucking the paperback safely in his backpack. “And make sure you drink enough water and get some sleep when you get home. And chuck that iced coffee, it reeks.”

“Will do.” 

Martin got up to leave and, on impulse, Jon grabbed his hand just so he’d look at him again. He certainly achieved that; Martin whipped around, uncertainty painted all over his face, staring between Jon and his hand in succession with a dizzy intensity. “Hey, Martin. I’ll make it up to you, somehow. I promise. I’m sorry…I’m sorry I can’t…”

Martin pressed his lips together carefully. “I believe you.” And then he untangled his hand, and Jon was alone once more.

-

noreply  
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**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm drunk right now and drunk brain has deemed this fine to post. i'll review in the morning. if it's atrocious/i've fucked the formatting please let me know. fun fact every time a reader gives feedback i gain 5 yrs of life !!
> 
> had a chat on the discord (love you, discord) abt what jon's favourite book would be and i'm still not sure if my first idea, memoirs of an infantry officer, reaaally fits? i am with martin here, sassoon's prose is so very dry. i cannot get through the bloody novel. but i love his poetry more than anything. so this chapter is dedicated to siegfried sassoon. i think perhaps he is turning in his grave. i love you sir
> 
> next chapter is so fun. they are up to some absolute ANTICS. more of every character. more jonmartin. i am thriving thank you so much for reading


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jon redeems himself...well, sort of, he really is trying his best. The gang have a great time. This is actually just a love letter to Timothy Stoker masquerading as a chapter

**Private Message**  
Georgie: omw home. can u preheat the oven for hash browns? do not have the patience today >:(  
Jon: Cute emoticon. Sure I can. Did your lecture overrun?  
Georgie: “emoticon” ffs  
Georgie: no i just got ambushed by my group for this project on FUCKING thomas hardy. the most boring writer in the world. and i was too polite to tell them i’d skipped lunch and was fantasising about roasting them on a stick  
Jon: Cannibalism is no joke, Georgie.  
Georgie: u completely lose ur tone over text and i have no idea whether you’re being serious  
Jon: It is a challenging form of communication  
Jon: Can I ask you for some quickfire advice?  
Georgie: sure  
Jon: Our seminar room is booked pretty much all fortnight—it’s the fucking drama students—and I know it was an oversight to not book in advance I’ve just been. Occupied.  
Jon: So, do I just go without any meetings for now? Let them do the research at their own pace? I’m just worried that a lack of face to face communication will be too difficult, especially as Tim seems insistent on cluttering up the group chat with useless chatter. And only Sasha can do independent translations.  
Georgie: not the drama students!! nah i think ur meetings are important. surely there’s somewhere else u can meet ?  
Georgie: hey, why don’t u invite them round. u can have the kitchen  
Jon: NO WAY. Absolutely not.  
Georgie: c’mon it’ll be fun. get a takeaway, couple of beers. might help ease up the tension and make u seem a bit more human. plus they all already know where we live  
Jon: Martin doesn’t.  
Georgie: c’mooooon  
Jon: I suppose I did promise Martin I’d make it up to him. And it would be a more relaxing group activity.  
Jon: Okay, then…  
Georgie: YES  
Georgie: IM SO PROUD  
Jon: Shut up.

-

They settled on the coming Wednesday, and Jon scheduled in a trip to the supermarket for beer and pizza. 

Beer and pizza were tactically the most neutral things he could think of, but even so, he was stressing in the frozen food aisle of the local Tescos, wondering whether his assistants would prefer peperoni or margarita. And he hadn’t even _thought_ about brands of beer. Maybe this was more trouble than it was worth.

He was so wrapped up in himself, that bumping into Daisy barely registered. She was standing in the dairy section, head bowed and shoulders globed just so, and her body language was so un-Daisy that he almost didn’t recognise her.

Almost. Jon was preparing to nod at her and go on his way, as he did when he met acquaintances in the local Tescos. It was her clenched fists that clued him in.

“Daisy?” He waited until he was within earshot and then called out, alerting her of his presence so he could slowly approach.

She just looked up wordlessly. Tears in her eyes.

Jon said the first thing that came into his head. “Um, San Miguel or Heineken?” 

“What?”

“I’m trying to decide what beer to buy.” Jon shuffled awkwardly, unsure of himself. Was he supposed to ask what was wrong? Give her a hug? The hardness of her mouth told him no.

She glanced at him again, incredulously, and then a giggle of disbelief slipped out. “You’re asking me what beer to buy?”

“I thought you might want to weigh in! I trust your judgement.”

“I don’t even drink, you idiot.” Her tone wasn’t unkind. Just flat.

“Would you, uh…” Jon scrubbed his hand against his face: a nervous habit. The crackle of stubble calmed him. “Would you rather talk about it?”

 _It_ meant the tears that didn’t stop flowing, despite her pretence of apathy. “No, you’re right. Your assumptions were right. I do not want to talk about it.”

Daisy pulled the sleeve of her jacket over her hand and wiped away her tears, careless and firm, until nothing but a blotchy face and shiny nose suggested anything amiss. Her jacket was too big for her, Jon noticed. It was well-worn, likely second hand, with messy stitches up the navy sleeve. It made her look- softer.

“Okay, well, please can you help me out. I’m having the research group over tonight and I thought I’d just stick a pizza in the oven and have some drinks but maybe that’s too boring? Should I cook them something instead? Or—”

“You’re always having a crisis, Jon,” she said sagely. Jon frowned. “I think you need to learn to give less shits. You’re giving too many shits.”

Jon was about to defend himself, but the quirk of her mouth made him hesitate. In the grand scheme of things; even just in the grand scheme of his life; pizza was a non-issue. His grandma always said he had a flair for the dramatic.

“You’re right about everything all of the time, Daisy.”

“I know.” She was looking very pleased with herself. That tension was still there, just under the surface, but to see the traces of a smile flicker across her face absolutely _delighted_ Jon.

He let himself smile back, let himself chuckle and spin to the nearest shelf. “Please bless me with more insight, oh wise one. Should I splash out on a Pot Noodle, or stick with the humble Super Noodle?”

She closed her eyes, focusing on an impression. Her mysterious voice was too scratchy and too deep, and Jon liked it very much. “Choose the Pot Noodle. You shall need its beefy tomatoness in the trying times ahead.” 

“Thank you, ancient one. Might you have any other wisdom to impart on me?”

“Hmm. I have two more titbits you may appreciate. One…” She dug a sharp elbow into his ribs. “Call me ‘ancient’ and I will pummel you.”

“Right.” His ribs hurt.

“Two: just buy some cheap wine. Everybody likes wine. Especially when it’s cheap.” When she grinned, she grinned with teeth.

-

Jon and Georgie’s flat had a circular dining table, which was an entirely inconvenient shape. They’d shoved it in the farthest corner of the kitchen, and, over time, it had collected various bits of clutter; a blender, a calculator, several bottle openers and corkscrews, broken mugs, dead plants, recycling that never made the journey to the bins. In short, it was a tip.

Jon’s lack of foresight and general ignorance meant that he was frantically trying to clear this all up five minutes before everyone was set to arrive. So, when Tim appeared, grinning in the doorway, he was mildly irritated.

“What on earth are you doing here?” he demanded, shoving a handful of loose buttons into a drawer. “Oh my God. That’s where I put the tomato puree.”

“I am here because you invited me!” He presented a bottle with a flourish. “Coconut rum. Half off in Lidl, baby.”

“Um. Thank you?”

“You’re extremely welcome, Jonathan. Now what can I do to help you out? Martin will have a fit if he sees all this junk.”

Jon blanched. “Oh no. Is he a tidy person?”

“We were in halls together last year. I visited sometimes. Fucking spotless.” He snatched up some empty crisp packets and started folding them into triangles.

Thankfully, the tidy person in question was ten minutes late, by which time Sasha appeared with speed tidying tips and Greggs. She was feeding Tim bits of vegan sausage roll with one hand, the other sorting cutlery to sell the illusion of functionality. Tim was making appreciative noises and leaning _a bit too closely_ into her. Jon was… uncomfortable.

When he heard the knock, he practically leapt towards the landing, but Melanie had already let him in, and they were chatting about gothic architecture.

“Martin!”

Martin stiffened. He was holding a six pack of beer; Heineken, he noted for next time; to his chest like a shield. “Jon?”

“Please save me from being a gooseberry, it’s unbearable.” He grimaced at Melanie, which meant ‘fuck off’. She obliged.

Martin didn’t say anything, looking completely bemused as Jon bundled him into the kitchen. 

“Hey, Martin,” said Tim conversationally. He was sitting on the, now spotless, table, an indiscreet arm on the small of Sasha’s back. Sasha was visibly flustered, but she covered it as best as she could with a nod of greeting. “Who’s that girl who let us in? Not your ex, right? Why’s she living with you two?”

Martin opened his mouth, and Jon turned to Tim in a blind panic. “That’s none of your business! Would you stop constantly blabbing about my personal life when there’s no need for people to know!”

The three of them were stunned into silence. Jon couldn’t help his eyes from flickering over to Martin.

“Uh, I know Georgie already. She’s in my Edwardian and early Modern poetry seminars,” Martin said, shuffling his feet.

Jon was hot with humiliation. Wordlessly, he snapped open his laptop and began his work. Just like normal, just like always, just like life was a series of well-rehearsed actions to carry out day-after-day. Open the browser, open Word, restore down. Bookmark the article, download the PDF, highlight the important bits, until everything was digestible words.

They all followed his cue. Obedient as anything. They were leaving it up to him, this time; no jokes to ease the mood, no thoughtful texts, no peace gestures. He sighed.

When Jon finally felt himself simmer down, he stood up, and immediately regretted it, because he looked stupid. But maybe they deserved as much.

“I am sorry for my outburst earlier. In fact, I am sorry all of my previous outbursts throughout this project. It’s unprofessional—no, more than that. It’s shitty of me. And anyway, it’s not about the project. You’re all good people who deserve nothing short of kindness and consideration. I’ve failed that. I’ve been very stupid and obtuse and self-absorbed, and I don’t expect forgiveness, but—”

Jon’s words were muffled into nothingness as Tim leapt away from his laptop and mushed Jon’s head into his side in an awkward and slightly painful hug.

“Mmphhh…Tim, you’re suffocating me,” he whined, but he didn’t mind one bit. He smelt like other people’s washing powder and sweat and aftershave.

When he was finally released, Sasha was grinning like the smile belonged on her face. “Nice one, Jon,” she said appreciatively.

“I forgive you!” Tim was clutching at the front of his jumper and pretending to swoon, but Jon wasn’t looking. He was focused on Martin. In that moment, it felt like whatever played out on Martin’s face was the only reaction that really mattered.

He was smiling, a small and secret smile. The tension in his shoulders was gone. They locked eyes, and Martin said, “Look at that. A face to face apology.”

“Huh. I guess it is.”

Their eye contact—that tentative moment of mutual attention, of contact from afar—lingered for a moment longer. Then Jon dropped it and steeled himself.

“Right. Time to pull our socks up. Sasha has found and adapted an automated translator that can do the basic translations from Greek, but it can’t translate in context. Tim, Martin, if you don’t mind, could you check the digital versions of the statements against these scans of the original fragments. Then send over the verified translation and Sasha and I will work on the nuances so we can get an accurate translation.”

They all nodded with a renewed determination. Jon continued. “And, after we get through our first two, I’ll put the pizzas in the oven.”

That prompted even more enthusiastic nodding.

-

They really didn’t get very far.

It started when the bot started bugging, error messages filling their screens, whenever certain words came up. Sasha had done her best, but admitted she found it and tweaked it from an obscure website, and Tim got flustered about viruses and Control-Alt-Deleted his way out of the situation. Jon thought it reasonable, so they decided to break for dinner. Only, the break didn’t seem to end.

Just as he had begun his work with the scissors (defending that, yes, using scissors to cut pizza was the most efficient method, and no, it wasn’t disgusting), Tim began to make moon eyes at the stack of drinks on the counter, and Sasha began fiddling with the kitchen speaker and showing her Spotify playlists to Martin.

Jon conceded and fetched a bottle opener. This wasn’t a night for working, perhaps. “Should we migrate to the living room?”

“ _Please,_ ” said Martin, grabbing one of his own beers.

And beer and pizza had turned to wine out of chipped mugs, and then the chipped mugs had been topped up with coconut rum, mingling with the dregs, and by Jon’s fourth piss he realised that he was _quite_ intoxicated.

“Jon’s a lightweight,” Tim jeered, and Jon was reminded of being sixteen at his first house party; a horrible, horrible night, thanks to his peers and his inability to act sober around his grandmother. He had never seen her so angry; yet it was the cruel words of his classmates that had hurt the most.

But Tim wasn’t like them. Tim was holding a Little Mermaid mug against his cheek and giggling into Sasha’s hair. That was—the past.

“I’m only small,” he said, laughingly. “Cheap to get pissed and all that. It’s a gift.”

“You’re a gift,” said Sasha, making grabby-hands. He just frowned at her, mind working at half its regular speed. She grunted, untangling herself from Tim so she could give Jon a cuddle.

That sort of thing, Jon mused to himself, could only be described as a cuddle. The semantics of cuddle versus hug were a very specific thing and had something to do with pressure and position and—oh, his thoughts had begun to sound like innuendos. Innuendos about Sasha, which was very terrible for someone who was cuddling you.

“I would never have sex with you, Sasha,” he whispered into her hair. She didn’t hear.

“Performance poetry is literally the coolest thing.” Martin was on the armchair, the rim of his mug of rum resting against his bottom lip and muffling his words. He was pissed, too; a ruddy flush covering his face and creeping down his neck.

“Oh God, no. No.” Tim groaned, but Martin ignored him.

“Just…just words spoken, you know what I mean? Like how words are meant to be. Just a random thought. I think maybe the printing press was the worst thing that ever happened to literature.”

Jon stiffened in Sasha’s arm. “No! Martin, that’s the worst thing you’ve ever said to me. It’s about the accessibility! Without the printing press, we’d all be Catholic serfs and die at like, 30. Miserable Catholics.”

“Oh, here we go,” said Tim. Sasha sank back beside him on the sofa, giving him a kick in the ribs for good measure. He just grinned and tugged at her socks, making her squeal and then settle her legs comfortably into his lap. Jon watched the ease with which they were entwined. More than cuddling; something like completeness, like two puzzle pieces.

“Oi. I’m Catholic. That’s offensive,” Martin replied.

“Wait, really?”

“No. I was lying.” Martin giggled to himself, like the world was a private joke. Maybe it was. Maybe subjective experience was just like having a really elaborate inside joke with yourself.

He tried to vocalise this, but the words didn’t happen. “More rum?” Jon said instead, offering the bottle only to Martin. He wasn’t sure why _only to Martin_.

“Stuff should be spoken aloud. This one time, I was drunk with this gorgeous boy and he stood up—no reason, nothing—and performed a whole soliloquy from Julius Caeser. In iambic pentameter. And I immediately fell in love with him.”

Jon watched him rapturously. His limbs felt weightless and inflated, with years and years worth of tension seeming to drain right out of a hole in his palm. Their project—the bug in the bot, like another piece in the puzzle—seemed nothing more than a tangle in the corners of his brain that he couldn’t reach through the fuzz. He was warm; so deliciously warm.

That was when the evening got disjointed in his memory, reducing to just a few images and sounds and a great big wave of contentment.

He remembered— sitting, cross-legged in the hallway with Martin fussing over the Admiral. His hand, slightly unsteady, scratching the cat’s tiny ginger chin.

“What’s his name?” Martin’s voice was thick with a sticky warmth.

“The Admiral,” Jon said fondly.

“Ooh. Hello, Admiral.”

“No.” Jon said, the hardness of his voice struggling through his wooziness. “No. His name is THE Admiral. Not Admiral. THE Admiral. You have to say, ‘Hello, THE Admiral.”

Martin gave him a bemused look, then paused for a moment. “Hello, THE Admiral.”

“Perfect.”—

—Lying, cheek pressed against the sofa, watching Sasha and Martin try and stuff slices of cold pizza into Tim’s mouth as he slept. He was drooling, his forehead creased. Sasha was trying to silence Martin’s giggles, but to no avail, and soon she was chucking too, hand pressed over her mouth and shoulders shaking, and Tim was stirring—

—Tim was dancing, a single slice of pizza still hanging out of his mouth. The music was folky and quiet, only Martin knew the words. Tim was bad at dancing, and he told Martin this fact like it was a secret.

Then Tim started miming a lasso and throwing it at Sasha’s armchair, where she curled up and shook her head. He persisted, pretending to reel her in with a shake of his hips. Sasha was laughing, now, hands hiding her face, glasses sliding down her nose.

“Do you reckon he does that in the club?” Martin whispered into Jon’s ear. His breath tickled.

“Oh, absolutely. I forgot that Tim’s a, um…how do you say…lad.”

Apparently, that was the funniest thing Martin had ever heard, as he laughed into Jon’s shoulder. “You’re so right. I bet he went on a lad’s holiday to ‘Nappa after sixth form.”

“I bet he showcased his dance moves in all the clubs there. I bet he was irresistible.”

“Oh, nothing helps you pull like a cowboy move.”—

—Sasha had relented, at some point, and the song had changed. Her head was on Tim’s shoulder, swaying to a rhythm that wasn’t in the song.

Martin and Jon were dancing circles around the pair, making fun of them. They didn’t notice, they were too wrapped up and dizzy to their own music, so the making fun became showing off. Martin would make a face and Jon would try not to laugh, then Jon would do a stupid thrusty dance move and Martin would double over with suppressed giggles, and they’d keep on taking it in turns, over and over. 

Until, they couldn’t hold in the laughter anymore. All Martin had to do was look at him and he’d be hysterical, and they took to dad dancing and delicious giggles, hips awkward and elbows knocking, jumping up and down ‘til breathless—

—Someone had switched off the music and found Jon’s guitar.

“Please. Please play us anything.” Sasha played the clarinet, but otherwise, they were self-declared unmusical. ‘A little tone deaf,’ Martin had described himself.

Jon smirked, positioning the guitar and arranging his features into a pretentious parody. “Anyway, here’s Wonderwall.” They all groaned in unison, and Jon felt mischievous.

He didn’t play Wonderwall; instead he played some Belle and Sebastian. Instrumental. Didn’t feel like singing. His fingers fumbled their way along the fret, and he found the right notes, more or less.

When he finished, his audience made no noise, just smiled into the warm, streetlamp-orange night. The quiet was peaceful.

“Would anyone like some toast?” Martin said. Wordlessly, Jon followed him to the kitchen. That was the last thing he remembered.

-

 **Private Message**  
Jon: Hey Daisy!! I hope you are okay and you are no longer crying!!. I think yorue really cool and scary and I hope nothing ever upsets you okay xxxxxx  
Daisy Tonner: thank you. i appreciate it. no longer crying. it was good to see you, i mean it. i think you’re cool too, jon.  
Daisy Tonner: now drink some water. idiot

-

It took Jon three tries to get out of bed and investigate the sounds coming from his kitchen. 

He was very hungover, and his skin felt like it’d been turned inside out. To be frank, he felt like death warmed over. But someone was banging about in his kitchen and curiosity overcame the inertia enough to wrap a quilt around himself and take a look.

It was only Tim, which felt a bit anticlimactic. He still had no idea what Tim was doing in his kitchen, but his swooping stomach and splitting headache seemed more urgent.

He fumbled past Georgie and Melanie and filled up a glass of water. And then another.

“Morning, boss!” Tim said brightly. He was…making pancakes?

“Ghphh,” said Jon. “W’times it?”

“Nine Fifty-Two,” Georgie supplied cheerily, opening a pack of blueberries. Jon was surprised; fruit didn’t usually manifest in their flat.

“Right. Why we all up?”

“Fun fact about me,” Tim said, leaning on the kitchen counter like he owned the place, or something. “I’m immune to hangovers. Also, I’m a morning person. Unlike somebody.”

He made towards Jon with an outstretched hand, and Jon dodged. “Tim. Boundaries. Also, I hate you.”

“We’re up ‘cos Tim’s making pancakes!” Georgie said smugly. “Tea’s in the pot. This is cute, isn’t it? We should do this more often.”

“Ladies.” Tim presented them each with pancakes, plated up and everything.

Reality began to filter through the fog of a night’s heavy drinking. The windows were open, and sunlight streamed through, the world reborn again and heavy with April morning damp. He could smell Melanie’s coffee; she had it strong, two sugars; and it stirred something pleasant in his stomach. The steam of the tea fogged his glasses. The radio was on, and Tim was humming, an upbeat melody that just escaped Jon’s recognition. 

“I like this one, Jon, you should shag this one more often,” said Melanie, her flippant expression stuffed full of syrupy pancake.

Jon slammed his mug on the table. “We. Did. NOT.”

“We did not, I am afraid to corroborate.” Tim presented Jon with his own pancake and lowered his voice to address just him. “I don’t imagine you remember, but you offered me a sofa to sleep on. Sash and Martin live in walking distance, they’re fine.” 

He was wearing Sasha’s favourite blue cardigan and a pair of boxers, and Jon just watched him for a second; not drawn by the toned lines of his body, but instead by the vulnerability and trust and domesticity that he didn’t know how to deal with it. Reminders of them; of friendship littered about the place, of Martin’s jumper still on the back of the chair.

When Tim had run out of mix and Melanie and Georgie were distracted enough, Jon spoke, unconsciously folding Martin’s jumper into a neat little bundle. It was grey and very soft.

“I’m going to translate all of the statements myself.”

Tim just nodded, smiling so brightly and bravely that Jon was stunned by the unrelenting optimism. Jon thought that Tim pretended some of the time, that he forced smiles and laughs for the benefit of others. But he wasn’t pretending now.

“You’re crazy, Jon. How would you feel about a hug?”

His eyes were quick and hopeful. “Yes. Fair warning, I stink,” Jon said. Tim didn’t mind.

-  
**Private Message**  
Basira: Are you able to meet? I’m in the campus Starbucks. Important. -Basira

-

Jon had not really thought through the whole ‘translating all of the statements by himself’ thing.

He’d offered because he was suspicious. The translator Sasha had adapted kept flagging up certain words; person/body, flesh, plague, darkness, to name only a few; and the pattern was more than just a coincidence. Maybe he was going crazy, but he had had plenty of time to grapple with his sanity over the course of the project so far.

It’s just—something was being covered up, not just in publications, but on the internet, as well. With all the bugs, the digital approach wasn’t working either way. Besides, a translation done by just him was just…more reliable. He could trust it. Nobody could tamper with his head, with his own agency, and he could investigate this for HIMSELF.

But, lord, was he tired. A conversation was the last thing he wanted to drag himself through, but the promise of caffeine made it somewhat bearable.

Basira was sitting by the window, her eyes fixed on a point in the middle distance. She was poised as ever, her crossed arms suggesting neutrality at the first glance, hostility at the second.

“Basira,” he said, gesturing awkwardly towards the counter. She just pursed her lips and pushed a black coffee towards him, still steaming. Oh.

“Thank you. I’ll pay you back.” He dropped his satchel carelessly and took the first, delicious sip.

“Yes,” she said.

“Um, anyway, what did you want to—is this about Daisy?”

“What? No. Daisy’s fine.” She seemed to actually look at him for the first time since his arrival; scrutinise him, in fact. He wondered what she was met with; eyebags and gaunt features, twitching mouth, lank hair falling all over his face. His brain couldn’t seem to translate this into self-consciousness. “Is that your jumper?”

“…Yes?” It wasn’t. He was lying.

“Right. Just didn’t seem your style. Or…size.” She smoothed the folds of her hijab, firm and quick, which was the first hint of a nervous habit Jon had ever seen her display. “I found something that you might be interested in.”

Jon just met her eyes with a mute desperation. 

“It’ll help. It’ll lead you in some interesting directions, I think.” Basira’s bag was plain and practical, but Jon noticed a few pins crawling up the straps with a quiet smile. She produced a notebook page and some newspaper clippings. “I did a pretty basic search of police archives and criminology studies for anything to do with ancient Alexandria, and this turned up.”

The first page’s headline, neatly printed in Helvetica, read ‘EGYPTIAN EYE GETS OWN BACK WHEN TOMB PLUNDERERS STRUCK BY ANCIENT CURSE’. It was dated 2009.

“Is this not a bit…sensationalist?”

“You have quite the way of expressing gratitude,” she said dryly. “The article goes into more detail. No record of what happened to the raiders, though.”

He gave her a guilty smile. “Thank you, Basira. This will really help. I’ll message the group in a bit.”

“I did learn there’s quite heavy charges for stealing artefacts. Don’t see what the big deal is about a few round bits of stone—”

“Only a succinct expression of architectural and artistic techniques of a long-dead empire, right down to the materials and honing techniques, the carving of the stone itself being the only mark of nameless craftspeople, carbon dating, the analysis of how artefacts were handled and combined and their relevance within culture, being able to hold what once was held by the hands of ancient people, and of course the immense significance of eye symbolism in Egyptian culture—”

Basira gave him a look. “Don’t see why they don’t punish all white people like that for stealing our shit.”

Jon thought of all the times he’d been the only brown person in History of Archaeology lectures, learning about all the British ‘greats’, criminals whose greed was whitewashed as discovery, all noble discovery in the name of imperialism. “I couldn’t agree more.”

Once the photocopies were safely in his satchel, Jon realised that he really, really didn’t want to think about the massive puzzle that was overtaking his life. Yes, he was so grateful that so many people in his life were as invested as he was, but it was just so suffocating, sometimes. Even with last night, even with the fumbling intimacy and tentative fun he had found with the three of them; he couldn’t help but pettily overshadow it all with the project that had brought them together. They were assistants before they were friends.

Basira was far too prickly and distant to be a friend, but Jon hoped, one day, that might change. And, if so, he didn’t want to make the same mistake and build another acquaintance on the fucking Serapeum. 

So, he decided. He was going to try and act normal.

“So. How are your classes going? What modules have you chosen this term?”

-

 **The SerapeOPLE**  
Jon: Hi guys. Check your email, Basira found something interesting. I think we should be able to meet next Monday, if not earlier? Let me know your availability and I’ll check the room bookings.  
Jon: Also for the record, the name of this group chat is stupid.  
Martin: I can do Friday morning, ‘til two-ish  
Martin: I couldn’t agree more. What does Serapeople even mean  
Tim: til 2 is good for me also fuck you  
Sasha: I’ll have to leave early for lunch but sounds gr888!!  
Martin: Oh, btw did anyone pick up my jumper last night? It’s grey and woolly I’m quite fond of it, please return  
_Tim changed the group name to_ **Jon Give Martin His Jumper Back**  
Jon: 10 until 2 it is, then.

-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in this au daisy and basira use their criminology degree to help with prisoner reform and rehabilitation. why? becase acab. https://blacklivesmatters.carrd.co/ for everything you can do to help


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jon can't stop thinking about Martin. Featuring some spooky statements and a few difficult conversations

Jon actually _was_ planning on giving Martin his jumper back, but then he found something.

It was a book. This, in itself, was nothing of significance, because books seemed to appear in every cranny of his living space. It was Georgie’s, maybe, or one from home, an old purchase he’d forgotten about. Nonetheless, Jon could not leave books unopened.

It was a tattered paperback edition of E. M. Forster’s _Maurice_ , with ‘Martin Blackwood’ pencilled neatly on the title page. Jon recognised Martin’s handwriting before he even registered the words. It was cramped and loopy and slanted to the left and it felt like lightness in Jon’s chest.

The cover was soft to touch, the spine cracked from reading and rereading. He fanned through the pages, realising with delight that there were pencil notes elsewhere in margins. It fell open somewhere in the middle, marked with a train ticket as a makeshift bookmark. London Thameslink travel card, 20th of June 2016.

He placed the paperback onto the papers he’d spread all over his desk; pressed it, committing the size and shape of it to memory. It was 4AM, he was knee-deep in a statement from Serapeum, but that felt like a footnote to this moment. 

Jon let himself breathe and catalogue what he knew so far. Martin, who liked lots of milk in his tea. Martin with his light hair and nervous habit of twisting that gold ring around his finger. Martin, who stroked cats underneath their ears and rambled about performance poetry and thought Siegfried Sassoon’s prose was dry but still liked his war stuff, Martin, who’s jumper smelt like dusty lavender, Martin, blushing when he danced, Martin who only annotated in pencil and was in London on the 20th of June and who’d left him a precious book about—

The bookmarked page had one annotation. _‘Foreshadows resolution. Conflict: doubt is an external force from Edwardian high society, but at the point of no return, Maurice can no longer deny love’._

Jon replaced the bookmark, found the first page, and began to read.

-

Jon was running late, which was the first weird thing. 

Since they had last met, he’d translated nearly five statements from scratch. It was too much, he was overworking himself, definitely; but Jon knew he could still do better. His brain just seemed to wander off. 

The Serapeum’s puzzle which had, just a few days ago, occupied his every waking moment, now seemed like a far-off dream.

It was that trancelike state that brought him, twenty minutes late, to the seminar room. It didn’t look real. He was so tired and confused and numb, but mostly just _confused_ , confused until the edges of his brain frayed. As proven by the book’s mysterious appearance, there was a significant amount of Wednesday night which he didn’t remember, which made him unbearably nervous. What boundaries might he have overstepped? God, Jon _hated_ forgetting.

“Sorry, I’m, um, sorry I’m late.” Those familiar faces smiling up at him. He fumbled with his satchel. “I’ve been—”

“Translating statements singlehandedly, we know. Tim told us.” Martin’s face was bright like the sun.

“Now we’ve all had a lovely shared experience with significantly lower inhibitions, I have decided to be completely candid with you all,” Tim announced, like he’d been planning a speech.

He hated to admit it, but Tim was right. There was a seismic shift in their dynamic since going to Jon’s house, and Jon did some quick reflection on all the times the conversation used to dry up the moment he came into the room, and concluded it was less a shift, and more, he’d actually been accepted into their social circle. Maybe he was more fun when drunk.

Plus, it was stupid, but inviting people into his house was a big deal for him. And he’d done it, now, it was the past. It meant nothing to them, he was sure, but Jon tended to feel vulnerable about stupid, irrational things.

“Oh really? Do you want to candidly talk about your feelings for Sasha, then, Tim?” Martin was so scathing, sometimes, and sarcastic and funny. He had this great ability to say things that Jon was thinking, and Jon wanted to agree, wanted to laugh along, but he was scared.

Tim choked. “I would love to, but actually, I think we should talk about our massive conspiracy situation. What I wanted to say was, this is completely batshit.”

Jon took that as ample opportunity to raise their latest thread. “So, in light of that, what are our thoughts on the article I forwarded to you about the eyes from the statues being cursed, as well as being heavily involved in some active missing people cases?”

There was a beat.

“Proves my fucking point, really,” said Tim, and Sasha and Martin laughed with their normal companionability. Jon chased the automatic grin off his face. No. He was—he needed to maintain a professional distance.

“I did as much follow up as I possibly could. There is a _lot_ of cover up, and I couldn’t find any articles. My guess is it’s pretty confidential and Basira has special access, but why? The media would eat it up, so why does it have to be kept under wraps?” Sasha’s hair was neat, and her eyes were sharp. Always so put-together.

“Yeah. The…the policies for access are strange and, to be frank, it’s suspicious. Is there any way of tracing them? Any involved parties, suspects?”

“This feels like a Scandi detective drama, but yeah, I’ve got some ideas,” said Martin. He was funny, too, when he wanted to be, just always hitting the right note. Jon felt like he should be taking notes. Oh, actually, he should definitely be taking notes, but on the research project, not on Martin’s behaviour. What a particularly odd thought.

“Yes?” said Jon, keeping his eyes fixed on the middle distance.

“The names have been changed but I found the Facebook for one of our missing people. Not on private, never been taken down. So, we can have a little look at his family and friends and get some idea of context.”

“What’s his name?”

“Samson Stiller.”

Jon lay his palms flat on the desk, slowly stretching them out, observing the way his tendons flexed. “Okay. Okay. Well, that can be our first point of action. Um, before we begin, I have something I’d like you all to weigh in on, though. One of the translations. The context is…confusing.”

They all reacted differently to ‘confusing’. Sasha and Tim’s eyes met immediately, and Jon watched as Tim’s eyebrows raised by a fraction, and in turn, Sasha’s shoulders dropped, her body relaxing as she smiled so small and privately that it was practically invisible. Tim’s legs were crossed. Martin’s eyes looked between them, and he shifted, to nudge Tim in a sort of acknowledgement. Tim nodded at him.

They were speaking in an entirely different language. It was fascinating, really; the academic within Jon wanted to catalogue this, observe and analyse, translate the symbols until the abstract human behaviour was tangible. 

But Jon wasn’t feeling like much of an academic today. No, today Jon felt small and selfish and tired. And all he wanted was to move a little closer to them, and for them—any of them—to look at him like that, with acknowledgement or recognition or relief, to communicate with him without the tricky generalisations of the English language.

Speaking of tricky generalisations. He unfolded the piece of paper from his satchel.

“Can I read what I have so far to you? I just want…I just want someone else to hear what I’m hearing. I don’t know what good it’ll do, but…”

“That’s okay, Jon.” Sasha’s voice was firm. Jon didn’t want to look up again in case he intruded in another moment between the three of them. He felt sick to his stomach, for no reason, the familiar angry irrationality of anxiety, just unprompted fucking anxiety, the kind of anxiety that ruined his day all the fucking time—

“Statement of Natan of Rhakotis, regarding direct encounters with a…yeah, I’m kind of confused by this word. It’s not person, it implies more…figure, shape…stranger. I’ll just say figure.  
Natan resides in the Navalia district, which just means near the docks, and experienced an encounter by their…um, home street, home address, I’m not sure. The street of their residence. It was nightfall, during winter. Light of the moon to see. I, um, they had business in the greater city districts. I think ‘business’ is an inuendo here.”

Jon’s eyes strayed from the page, whetting his lips. They were all watching. He felt so horribly exposed, but now he had got going, the momentum was hard to resist. He felt like he had to do this; he felt like he needed them.

“I made my way by foot, fast. It was…cold. There was nobody else, abandoned, empty. I walked through the market square, as my…home, um, is by the harbour. The trees cast strange shadows and I was walking as fast as I could, the moon …Khonsu, they say, the god of the moon, the traveller, which is weird, because Natan is a Hebrew name. Anyway, um, the moon was unsettling, and thoughts of thieves on my mind, in my thoughts. Below the trellis…this might be roof, actually…”

Jon swallowed. “Below the roof, completely out of sight, was THE figure. Male, large, indistinguishable. I continued my pace, as I did not want any trouble. They said, ‘Can I have a pitcher,’ and it startled me. Their voice was quiet, with a certain intrigue, and I stopped and leaned closer. I didn’t want to be rude; I was in good spirits after all. ‘Can I have a pitcher,” they said again, louder, and I couldn’t help but shiver. It was a stomach feeling, um, gut instinct, of something being bizarre about this figure. I had been warned of certain figures that appear at during deep night. I began to fear for my safety.  
But I wanted to oblige. I fought against my dread, and I had a pitcher for the figure. My mind felt all addled. They reached out, a long hand, a beckon, and said it one more time.  
And this confirmed what I thought. It was one of those, which…your people…had warned me of. A figure of uncanny movement, whose words did not come…right. A figure who spoke from within, with no movement, no tongue.  
I realised their feet did not, in fact, touch the ground. I returned home as soon as possible. I am certain that what I saw matches the description of the…this definitely, this context, I think it means stranger. The description of the malicious Stranger.”

He finished with a breath that was pulled out of him, dizzy with a lack of oxygen and an excess of intense words.

“Shit, Jon,” said Martin. Jon couldn’t focus his eyes.

“Right. That’s…a bit more odd than I expected,” said Sasha rapturously.

“I think you can expect the odd, in this kind of thing. Cursed fucking statues,” Tim muttered with a brimming resentment. It was scary to see Tim act like that, so intense, so negative.

“But that’s just, that’s just sensationalist news stuff. This is a statement that was preserved in an ancient library. They thought…they knew this shit was important. They wanted to preserve it.”

“And it’s been translated into a multitude of languages and, what, nobody’s ever noticed?” Martin demanded.

Jon sighed. “I mean, ancient Greek is a little bit…subject to interpretation. It’s usually read as a reference to enemies of the city, basically. No tongue meaning speaking in tongues or literally just speaking in a different language. But, uh, I just can’t help but think about the use of…stranger. Not enemy, not soldier. They had words for immigrants and foreigners. This means…it suggests it’s less than human.”

“Easy enough to alter the meaning,” Tim said. “For anyone’s convenience.”

“But why?” Jon felt…despairing. “God, why? We just have more questions. First prophecies, now cursed eyes and…”

“Ghosts.” Martin got up. “I’m going to make some tea.”

Yes. Ghosts. No surprise that the English student could read subtext. Every limb in Jon’s body felt heavy, and he folded himself up on the desk, collapsing and drained. He didn’t speak.

He didn’t move, wondering if the group’s easy dynamic would function better without him and his racing anxieties. All he seemed to do was create _more_ questions and _more_ problems, and he hated this restless, restless mind. Never relenting; half the time his mind didn’t feel like a part of him. It was its own creature, spiteful, creating problems and winding Jon around and around until he was sick to the stomach. He _hated_ it. Why couldn’t he let this go? Why couldn’t his mind let this go?

God knows he was tired. And useless, today. He could feel Martin hovering above him for a second too long, before a careful hand placed down a mug. Martin touched his arm, lightly, and he only just stopped himself from flinching. If he turned his head, he could see the mug, which had a cartoon cat on it.

“Thank you,” he said, words muffled by his sleeve. Jon couldn’t see Martin from this angle, but he hoped he was smiling like he always did.

-

_Did you ever dream you had a friend, Alec? Someone to last your whole life and you his. I suppose such a thing can’t really happen outside sleep._

Maurice was full of thoughtful and slightly self-conscious dialogue like that, and Jon thought of it often, thought and thought until he accidently memorised whole passages by heart. Martin had underlined that one three times, he remembered.

-

“Hey, Jon, I’m heading home.” Jon’s vision was blurry from staring at his laptop, reducing Martin to a smudge in his peripheral. 

“Okay,” he said pointedly, and went back to scrolling through the implications and dual meanings of ‘roof’ in Ancient Greek, which was super interesting, actually, it had a lot to do with dialect and local architecture—

“That was a hint.”

“Okay,” Jon repeated. “For what?” He asked belatedly.

“You got your bike today?”

“No, I took the bus. Why?”

Was that a snort or a sigh? “C’mon, I’m walking your way. Come with. You need to head back, too, or you’re going to get kicked out. Elias will chase you out of Social Sciences with a broom.”

“That’s a terrifying mental image. And I doubt he knows what a broom is. That man has hired cleaners his whole life, you just know it.” He closed his laptop with a show of reluctance, and tried to refocus his eyes. It didn’t work.

“Explains a lot about him, I think.”

Jon laughed, relenting and packing his work away with precision. They walked through the building and out of the doors, shoulder to shoulder. “Anyway. How are you?”

Martin looked at him with such deliberation, as if it wasn’t a simple question. Well, Jon supposed it wasn’t a simple question; but it was usually a passing one. You usually said ‘fine’ or ‘great’, and then, ‘how about you,’ and then know that neither of you really cared about the answer. Jon never told the truth.

“I’m actually okay. I’ve had more of a chance to relax this week, you know, watch a bit of telly and listen to some music and get some writing done. More breathing room. I feel better. How about you?”

“Yeah, yeah, fine.” Martin just stared. “Well. Not always fine. I’m very…I’m having an anxious day, you know. Woke up just feeling…shit like this. Probably going a bit insane, but that’s all par the course.”

“Hey. Get some rest when you’re home yeah?” Martin said. Jon nodded, knowing that he wouldn’t, because rest just made it worse. “Or—not rest, take a break. Do something different, so you don’t get in a funk.”

“Yeah.” Jon scrabbled for something to change the subject, scanning Martin for inspiration. He had a new jacket, forest green. Brought out his eyes. Jon felt somehow that he was back at square one, not knowing how to bridge the gap, in spite of all the effort he’d made. “What do you mean, get writing done? What writing?”

“Oh, nothing. Poetry. It’s not…”

 _Oh._ Frantic, Jon searched for what Tim or Sasha would say to this, how real friends would react to this new information. He couldn’t just file it away; Martin was searching him, searching for a response with a desperation that was tangible. Of course he was; it was a very personal thing, was poetry. Should he tease him? Encourage him?

“That’s cool,” Jon said lamely. “Um, that’s a really nice thing to do. I’d like to…hear it?”

Martin laughed, bitterly. “Let’s be real, Jon. You don’t want to hear that stuff, nobody does. It’s embarrassing, so I’ll spare you.”

He thought of the paperback currently sitting on his bedside table. The annotations were a window into Martin’s brain and the way he processed things, the ideas he had. And Jon liked what he saw. It was fascinating and so detailed and precise. His favourite was when Martin picked up on a phrase he would’ve just skimmed over, something seemingly unimportant; and the pencilled scribbles would draw allusions Jon never would’ve noticed, pulling out the novel’s beautiful patterns in a method that was in itself a marvel to witness.

They turned a street corner, Martin fumbling a little to let Jon go ahead of him. It was just like he used to be, all nervous, bleeding into the shadows and pressing into walls, and Jon found this regression quite frustrating.

“Did you leave the book—” he began, just as Martin said, “Do you have my jumper?”

The remaining words lodged themselves firmly in the back of Jon’s throat. Martin seemed equally as taken aback, making an abortive noise.

“Yeah, I did,” Martin managed. “We had a whole conversation.”

Jon hoped this might jog his memory, but when he grappled for it, his mind was just gaping and blank from a certain point afterwards. Not even a blurry sort of excitement; just a blank slate. His lungs burned.

That was when he finally looked in front of him, to see a tiny woman with bright hair and a leather jacket kicking the shit out of a stop sign.

“Melanie?” he called, out of surprise more than anything else. She turned, face venomous. 

“Hi, Melanie, it’s Martin! Nice to see you again!” Martin said brightly, his hand raised in greeting. A posturing of positivity, regardless of Melanie’s aggression. How did he do it?

She just stared for another second, then went back to the task of kicking. Jon couldn’t help but wince, even though she was well-protected by her huge Doc Martens.

It was clear something was wrong, and Jon and Martin exchanged a loaded look.

“Hey, Melanie? I’m coming over if that’s alright,” Martin said gently.

“Hi Martin,” she said, not pausing in her attack. Martin glanced back at Jon, wincing, but Jon felt all useless and frozen into place.

“You going home? Or are you off somewhere?” Jon couldn’t even be irritated by Martin’s use of home. Yes, Melanie did not pay rent and the flat belonged to him and Georgie, and yes, it had always been him and Georgie. But that was him just nit-picking, and he knew that right now, that wasn’t important. Right now, Melanie was important.

“Home,” Melanie replied.

“Awesome! Want to walk with us?” Her gaze snagged on Jon, and hardened. Martin rushed to change the subject. “I love your Docs, by the way. Where did you get them?”

She scowled. “The Doc Marten shop.”

“Yeah, okay, that was a stupid question,” Martin said good-naturedly, letting a silly giggle escape. He was so perfectly…Martin. Jon found he didn’t have the words, anymore. “I was thinking of getting some myself, actually. My shoes always wear out so quickly, it’s irritating.”

She stopped kicking, then, sheepishly examining the sole of her shoe. “Well, they sustain kicking, usually, so. I’d actually say they’re a really good investment. It’s expensive, the price tag freaked me out a bit, but I’ve had these like five years. And they’ve lasted.”

“Oh yeah? Do you know if you can get them second hand?”

“Yeah, usually, but be careful, yeah? Don’t order online. The whole idea is that you break them in yourself, so they fit the shape of your foot. It’s like a whole thing.”

“Sounds painful.”

“You’ll survive.” Looking between the both of them, her face shifted ever so slightly, like sand in the wind. Her voice became decisive. “So? We walking together or not?”

-

Jon had stayed resolutely quiet up until Martin had to leave, his accommodation being nearer campus than Jon’s flat. Actually, Jon suspected he’d walked the long way home, just to prolong his supervision of the two of them.

But he’d finally left with a weird, lingering apology, and now there was no excuse. They lived in the same flat, unfortunately, so Jon couldn’t pretend he had anywhere else to go. And now he had ten minutes of silence to fill.

Jon didn’t have any trouble talking to people. As a child, he was generally silent, and the prospect of talking one and one to somebody made him balk. He didn’t have that problem anymore, as somewhere along the way he’d come out of his shell a bit; the problem was, people didn’t tend to like the shape Jon which had emerged from that defensive shell. They didn’t really care what he had to say. Which was fair enough.

“Anyway, so. How much do you know about antisemitism in Alexandria in 300AD?”

She gave him a look of withering incredulity, unwinding her earphones from her jacket pocket. “You’re really boring, sometimes, you know that?”

“So, is that a no?” he said spitefully.

“I’m just saying. I can’t believe Georgie ever agreed to date you. She’s like, the most interesting person ever.” Her voice was matter of fact; her expression carefully schooled to neutrality.

“She didn’t agree, actually, she asked me.”

“Even weirder.” Jon wanted to punch her in the face. Jon wanted to storm off or tell her to never come back to his house or he’d report her. Jon wanted to tell her to fuck off.

He didn’t do any of those things, though, because before his body could react an image of Martin’s disappointed face appeared in his mind’s eye. He couldn’t let Martin down; not when he’d done so much to dissipate the tension. How could he be so horrible and spiteful as to even think about doing those things?

Instead, Jon just said “Okay.” Then, “Are you going to listen to music?”

“Yeah. Does that bother you?” It was a challenge, he could tell. But this was better territory. Here was one of his many ‘ _boring_ ’ interests, and he hoped that maybe Melanie might be able to find something like common ground.

“Not at all. What are you listening to?” She turned her phone screen for a split second, thankfully enough time for him to glimpse the album cover. “Oh, I love Goat Girl.”

She looked at him, and Jon thought for a second he’d pissed her off even more, but then she laughed abruptly. “You’re shitting me. _You_ like Goat Girl?”

“That so hard to believe?” he replied, trying to imitate Martin’s technique of humorous self-deprecation. It seemed to work: the line of her jaw and shoulder began to soften. “My favourite song’s The Man. I love feminist punk. I think only women deserve punk music, to be honest.”

“Technically they’re post punk,” she said, fighting down a smile.

“Still stands.”

They fell into a silence that was far less tense, and Jon felt like he’d achieved something, small as it may be. He didn’t expect her to turn to him, suddenly, and offer him one of her earbuds.

“Oh. Thank you.” She was playing his favourite song.

“Yeah. Sorry for being kind of mean to you. I’m not in the best space right now.” Jon was about to assure her it was fine, but she continued. “No, I need to start expressing my emotions in more healthy and honest ways.”

She was saying it like a script she’d rehearsed. “Um, well, we don’t really know each other that well—”

“Yeah, and that should probably change if we’re living together. I think we got off on the wrong foot. And I didn’t like you for a while, but only because I thought you hated me.”

“I don’t hate you, I just… I just…”

“I understand. It’s fine,” she said, and Jon was taken aback. Even he didn’t understand what he was trying to say, he didn’t even come close to understanding why he tried to distance himself from Melanie. But apparently, she saw something he didn’t. “I like you now. Or I think I could. You’re friends with Martin and I like Martin.”

Seems like Martin made him a more likable person by proxy. “Thanks?”

Melanie sighed, just as the song changed, and Jon let the silence settle over him for a fleeting moment. “I, uh. I had a fight with Georgie.”

“Oh. I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Yeah. I don’t want you to think I’m some kind of freak, just beating up stop signs for fun. I’m trying to channel my aggression. Like, in ways that don’t hurt actual people. So, I figure public property is fair game.”

“Okay.”

“That’s it, really. That’s where my head’s at right now, that’s my honest truth, etcetera etcetera, so shall we just spend the rest of the journey enjoying Goat Girl without all that weird, awkward tension?”

“Sounds excellent,” Jon said, and this prompted another smile, just for him. He couldn’t help but blurt his own honest truth, or whatever Melanie meant by that. “I don’t think you’re a freak, by the way, and my opinion on that shouldn’t matter.”

“Thanks Jon. Seriously.” Her chin was facing upwards, now, a little slice of optimism. “Hey, wanna play Super Smash Bros when we get back?”

Jon weighed this up. On the one hand, that was a very intimidating offer, as if Melanie could kick stop signs with such acute aggression then she could certainly destroy him at video games. On the other hand, Martin had something about changing up his routine to ease his anxiety. Maybe he needed an outlet, too.

“Okay. Why not?”

-

 **Private Message**  
_Martin has sent a tweet._ Tell me this cat is not Elias seeing cleaning equipment  
Jon: Haha!! Looks like the Admiral.  
Martin: Ooh tell THE Admiral that I love him  
Martin: emphasis on the THE. How come you’re allowed pets in your flat, by the way ??  
Jon: God, you remember that whole conversation? It was very obnoxious. I’m so sorry.  
Martin: It’s okay, it was funny :D  
Jon: :)  
Jon: Georgie is very manipulative and had some words with the landlord. I’m impressed too.  
Martin: Might need her help next year. I want a cat so much!!!  
Jon: Yeah.  
Jon: I’ve been reading Maurice, by the way. And also I have your jumper. I’ll wash and return next time, is that alright?  
Martin: That’ll be great!! And what do u think of the book ??  
Jon: I don’t remember you lending it. What happened?  
Martin: You don’t have to stress!! Just a little chat, just me chatting on and on about my usual rubbish. Sasha and I left pretty soon after. Dw!!

-

Jon finished his latest statement at about 10PM; which, by his clock, was plenty of time to do some more research. But he decided against it. The tension of the day had finally dissipated, and he was boneless and feeling self-indulgent.

Georgie had got back about an hour previous, and he could hear show tunes coming from her room; the kind she’d play when she needed some light-hearted escapism. He decided to go and bully her about it.

“What’s this, then? Oliver of the Opera? Wicked Side Story? Um…The Lion…Cabaret?” He leaned against the frame of her door, waiting for an invitation.

“Good effort, poor execution. It is actually Cabaret, though. Twat.”

Jon hummed, deliberating. “Good for…singing drunk?”

“Excellent for belting drunk.”

“Ah, yes, of course. I’m glad to hear.” She wasn’t crying, which is what he’d been most afraid of. Georgie didn’t cry much, except at rom-coms and Bambi, which was very justified. Bambi was fucking sad.

But Jon knew she was upset, knew it like he knew the Greek alphabet and the words to Bohemian Rhapsody and all his year seven passwords. Instinctively.

“Can I come in?” he asked, trying to remember how Martin had managed to calm Melanie down a few hours earlier. This was different, though, and he was kicking himself for being such a shit friend that he didn’t even know how to cheer Georgie up.

“Sure, you can.” She turned the music down and budged up, so he could perch on the bed.

“Shit day, isn’t it? I think it’s cursed. Nobody’s happy today. Apart from Martin.”

She laughed a little. “Ooh. Good for Martin.”

Jon stretched his legs out until his socks rested on her arm. Physical contact was easiest like this; just resting, just leaning, just touching a little bit. It felt familiar and never pressurised, just a little, passive acknowledgement of love. “Hey, remember when we first collected the Admiral from the shelter? And he was called—”

“He was called Toes, yeah, I remember. God, what a stupid name.” She was laughing again, fond. “And we both thought the concept of feet, toes, and associated, were just too grim, we said to each other, can’t have that one. Unfortunate.”

“Honestly, what was going through the staff’s mind when they named him that? Actual animal abuse.”

“I have no clue. It must get hard to think of names when you have so many cats.”

“Having too many cats to name is the exact opposite of a problem.”

“Ugh, I wish my problems were cat-related.” Georgie’s voice turned momentarily wistful, before she gathered herself. “And we saw him on the website, as well, remember? And it was a firm no from both of us. Can’t have a cat named Toes.”

“And he charmed us anyway. My goodness, that little face.”

She giggled. “I felt so mean! I can’t believe the little bastard _guilted_ us into adopting him.”

“You wouldn’t have it any other way.”

They fell into an easy quiet. Jon listened to the tinny sound of music coming from her laptop, balanced on a pile of books by her bed. Georgie’s room was smaller than his, but slightly cleaner, and more homely, somehow. She had flowers in vases and bookshelves ordered by author, as well as empty cups of tea and half-finished paintings and embroidery and scribbled post-it notes sprawled on her desk.

“Hey, Georgie? What’s your favourite musical? I’ve never asked.”

“No, you haven’t,” she said, musing this. “To be honest, that’s a very complicated question, and I won’t bore you by monologuing about it.”

Jon laughed an absurd little laugh. “Melanie called me boring today.” Georgie’s face immediately crumpled, looking torn between defending her and apologising on her behalf. Jon interjected hurriedly. “I just meant, um, I didn’t mind. I just meant I wouldn’t find you boring.”

She smiled and her body relaxed, at last. “Thank you. I don’t find you boring either.”

“You sure?” Jon said, teasing.

“Well, yeah, you are a bit boring sometimes. But I still love you.” She sighed, shook her head. Turned to meet Jon’s eyes with a trembling intensity. “No, not still. I love you for it. I love you being boring.”

Jon didn’t know what to do with the vulnerability in her eyes, so he shoved his sock in her face. “I love you too, Georgie.”

She giggled, swatting him playfully away. “Please, God. Not the toes!”

“Right. Musical. Monologue. Favourite. Bore me to sleep, please,” Jon said, and, cheek pressed against Georgie’s duvet with the rise and fall of her voice lulling him, he felt wholly content.

-

 **Jon Give Martin His Jumper Back**  
Sasha: Guess who’s friend request got accepted by Samson Stiller’s mum ;)  
Tim: damn sasha!! look at her go!!!  
Martin: Omg how?????  
Sasha: The secret ingredient is identity fraud~~~  
Sasha: For legal reasons that is a joke. Jon pls don’t report me  
Jon: Meeting A.S.A.P?  
Tim: guys look jon used an acronym this is progress  
Martin: We’ve still got to work on it. He used full stops between the letters  
Martin: But yes :) can meet asap  
Jon: I dislike you all.  
Jon: But also. Good work. Thank you all, you’ve really gone above and beyond and I do really appreciate it, and I should say that more often  
Sasha: Anytime!!  
Tim: <3 <3 <3 <3 uwu

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i did that 'what tma character are you' and i got Jon. it hurt all two of my feelings. projecting? no sorry idk her
> 
> also lol i've never read maurice but i've seen the film several times during my hugh grant phase. it's a masterpiece really
> 
> as ever thank you for reading, hope this chapter was alright!!


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jon is doing his masters. he's not very good at making friends, until he accidentally uncovers a conspiracy. the serapeum collect statements: only, the statements reference events that haven't happened yet. looks like they're predicting the future: sounds supernatural. not to mention there's this whole thing about an eye? some cursed eyes? that's weird.
> 
> when we left the mystery gang, jon was translating the verbatim statements from ancient greek (that's tricky! nice one!) and they seem to describe supernatural encounters. he's apologised to the gang, and it seems like against all odds, they really like him. martin even lent him his favourite book. jon likes it. jon likes it a lot. also, sasha has tracked down a closed missing persons case of samson stiller, who was apparently cursed by some eyes? wack. things are looking up for jon. melanie is still living on his sofa. actually some nights she sleeps in georgie's bed. wonder what that's about.
> 
> in today's episode: how long can jon not notice his Feelings for martin? the answer may surprise you. !!elias bouchard tw!!: he's a bastard. the gang attend a party with daisy and basira and get moderately to extremely drunk. will jon realise he has friends now?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> gssgg holy fuck guys im so sorry for that imprompteu hiatus. i was working on my RQBB fic and it was a Lot. please read it i worked so hard. it's pure jonmartin there's literally no other characters it is literally just them lol. i'll link below, or just click on my user to find it
> 
> !!! I am conscious that it's been ages!!!! to help with picking up the threads of the plot, check the summary above, and i've done my best to signpost and reiterate some key through lines here. should make sense for u all!!!!
> 
> again i'm so sorry. i'm back on the groove now. hope u enjoy and thanks for your patience!  
> CW: it's loosely implied that Jon has had issues with alcoholism

And, there was this aching thing in the chasm of Jon’s chest, that grew and grew and swallowed him up. If you asked him, Jon would guess it started somewhere between the pages of Martin’s favourite book.

It became a habit. Jon was a slow reader when it came to fiction, so he fell into a routine in which Martin’s book became his escape. Third translation in a row, caffeine losing its effects, eyes stinging and head pulsing; he’d stretch, take a moment, breathe. Then he’d pick up Martin’s book and read to set his racing mind at ease.

His favourite pages were the ones stained with tears. Jon knew they weren’t tears of sadness, nor were they really tears of joy; just, hope, caught up in a precious story.

This made Jon ache more than ever.

-

Sasha rang Jon to tell him she’d be an hour late, sounding extremely out of breath. Jon really didn’t mind. If they were characters in the stupid action movies Georgie liked, Sasha was certainly the brains of the operation, which made Jon— what?

He shared this thought with Martin once he arrived, making a beeline for the breakroom. Martin was fiddling with the microwave.

“Action movie, huh? I would think we’d be more, uh, noir detective film. Scooby Doo at the very best. Have you eaten yet today?”

“It’s all the same thing, just different flavours.”

“Genres.”

“What?”

“The word you’re looking for is genres.” Martin chuckled good-naturedly. “I’m going to presume you haven’t eaten, then. Cheese wrap?”

Jon frowned. “I think Sasha’s the brains, and Tim is either the grizzled protagonist or...hmm.”

“You kidding? Tim’s the femme fatal, 100%. And Sasha is the whip-smart protagonist. Do you like sweet chilli sauce? Allergic to any vegetables?”

“If Sasha’s the main character then you’re, like, the secretary. What am I?”

“Ooh, I’d say you’re the comic relief.” It was sarcasm, which Martin had recently started to use to tease him. Jon tried to look insulted. “I’m adding pepper and lettuce, so don’t complain.”

“What’s that you’re making?” Jon leaned over, and for a moment, the two of them were in awkwardly close proximity, before Jon regained enough muscle control to dart away.

“Snack. I promise it tastes nice, and it’s very quick.” Martin ducked his head to avoid eye contact. Eye contact was something they’d been getting better at, so Jon hoped he hadn’t done anything to offend Martin, but this certainly seemed…

“For me?” he breathed, reverent.

“Yeah. For you.”

Jon didn’t know how to reply, how to thank him. This was-- really considerate. Martin was…

The microwave beeped. Martin dutifully handed Jon the plate and started studying the paperback tucked into his pocket, presumably so Jon could eat without feeling awkward. It was just so goddamn considerate that Jon didn’t know what to do with himself.

So, he ate the wrap.

“Thank you, Martin,” Jon said awkwardly. Martin just nodded.

The silence was broken by Jon’s phone going off. The volume was too loud; Jon didn’t receive messages enough to be bothered by it; and Martin all but jumped out of his skin.

Jon read the text out loud for him. “hi boss have fallen asleep in one of the laundrys in Halls not sure where but think it’s university property i am hungover and very late sorry however i would recommend sleeping on a washing machine at least once in your life is very comfy very sorry about this tim.”

Martin laughed, the joy erasing the creases of his face until, to Jon, he was a blur of warmth and kindness beside him. It was slightly overwhelming, so Jon placed his plate in the sink and wondered if he needed a new prescription and tried to ignore the fuzzy voice in his head telling him over and over again that it was him, it was _him_ who had made Martin laugh.

“Well, I suppose it’s just us for a while. Shall we?” Still no eye contact. The seminar rooms were so cold this time of year; Jon was dreading it, and Martin’s jumper was folded up in his satchel, and the sweet chilli sauce still lingered on his lips.

“I mean, Sasha has all the information. So.” Martin’s feet were shuffling restlessly, dancing to some far-off rhythm.

“See! The brains of the operation!”

“Don’t tell me you’re developing an inferiority complex.” It was a joke, but it also wasn’t.

“I’m not.” Martin just gave him a significant look, which irritated Jon. “I’m serious, Martin, I’m not. Why don’t people believe me when I say something?”

“Okay,” said Martin. “I believe you.”

Neither of them made to leave the kitchen. Jon’s eyes found the window, the view from which was mostly obscured by a birch tree. The silvery tones trembled against a heavy grey sky. The garden which the kitchen window looked out upon was owned by some rich benefactors of the university and was walled and gated and never open to the public, Jon knew. This gave him a familiar itch to _see._

“Do you want to sneak into the private garden?” Jon said carefully, studying Martin for his reaction. 

Martin was good at hiding facial expressions. Jon’s working theory was that he just perpetually looked a bit flustered, and that tended to throw anyone of the scent of his genuine facial cues. 

It also could be that Jon was a bit face blind. But he was trying, and he was also learning that extended silences were not a good sign.

“You’re shitting me,” he said, eventually.

“Nope. I think we should.”

And then, a devilish smile crept across Martin’s face, and Jon could certainly read that. “You’re full of surprises, you are. Go on then.”

And this time, Martin spoke with such delight— delight with him— that Jon lit up under his gaze. “I reckon the window in the seminar room is our best bet, if you give me a leg up.”

It worked, more or less; Jon went first, barrelling straight into a thorny bush, followed by Martin, who squeezed through unscathed. It had been raining, but it wasn’t anymore, so Jon’s ungraceful landing sprayed them both with water.

“Oh, come on, this is a new shirt!” Martin whined, shaking out his raincoat. “Shall we have a look around?”

Jon nodded, his hand going to his shoulder bag. Martin’s jumper was inside, freshly washed and tumble dried. He should give it back.

It had obviously once been well-cared for, the remnants of raised beds and climbing roses and bizarre-shaped bushes suggesting it had once been used by the university. For botany students, maybe? Whoever owned it wasn’t sharing it, though, and clearly didn’t care enough to employ gardeners. Shame.

Beyond the row of birch trees, there was an archway leading to a ‘secret’ garden that couldn’t be seen out the window. Martin was grinning at him, the delightful curiosity painted across his face. His hair was slightly damp, curls dark and heavy, and Jon could smell his shampoo when he reached over and grabbed Jon’s hand.

They practically ran to the secret garden. Jon’s hand was so warm, and so were his cheeks.

The place they emerged into was beautiful. In the centre was a large pond, almost indistinguishable from the lawn because of the blanket of algae and orange leaves. A weeping willow trailed over its surface. There were apples beneath Jon’s feet; an early harvest, windfall, maybe; and dying sweet peas climbed a faux-Greek statue of Dionysus.

“Oh, look at that,” Martin said, his voice full of awe. They were still holding hands. Jon didn’t let go, out of indulgence, out of the simple thrill of a warm hand in his.

“I can’t believe this has been here, the whole time.”

“Yeah. Honestly, all those times I’ve been bored to tears, staring out the window, and I never would’ve thought this was here…” Martin’s eyes darted to Jon, suddenly solemn. A sour feeling twisted in Jon’s stomach; to Martin, he is still the snob, the stuck up academic who disapproves of people without reason. It occurred to Jon that maybe that’s how Martin will always think of him, no matter how much he tries to prove him wrong. First impressions last, after all.

He dropped Martin’s hand.

“We can’t be seen, here, right?” Jon thought it was probably a bad thing to say, at the time, but it was the first thing to pop into his head. And filtering speech is difficult.

“No, I’m sure we can’t.” Martin was standing, looking a little lost.

“Well, I say, we have about half an hour, so…” Jon got distracted by the willow tree. Back home, when he was a child, he’d find the biggest by the river and sit against the trunk and spent the day reading. Sometimes he’d just stare into nothingness and think. The branches protected him from the other kids and the worried adults, and he could just be himself for a little while.

Martin followed him through the branches, dripping and slimy with rainfall, and he squealed when a droplet went down the back of his shirt, and Jon immediately felt a little better when they were hidden in their own little canopy. The ground here was drier, so Jon sat himself down.

After a few minutes of silence, Martin cleared his throat. “Okay. What do you want to talk about?”

Jon was feeling a bit like a child again, from all those memories.

“Um… how was your day?” Jon didn’t want to be too boring for Martin, and for Martin to leave, like kids used to.

Martin gave him a considering look. “I can’t lie, I literally woke up an hour ago, so I don’t really have a lot to report on.” Jon made an embarrassed noise, covering his face. “But I can confirm that it’s going well so far.”

Jon peered out from between his fingers. Martin was smiling at him generously, and he couldn’t help but giggle.

Acting silly and childish was nice, sometimes. Jon made a mental note.

“Hey, I’ve been reading Memoirs of an Infantry Officer, though,” Martin offered, still smiling, like they were sharing a joke or at the very least sharing a _moment_ , just the two of them, wrapped in the peaceful canopy of a golden-strained willow tree. “It’s good.”

“Isn’t it! I just think it’s so interesting to read about how people coped with such a situation.”

“You were right, actually, it’s much more interesting with all the death and mortal terror.” He liked it! 

See, Jon was no good at making friends. Jon was only friends with those stubborn enough to keep talking to him despite how utterly unbearable and rude and boring and spiky he acted, and even those tended to lose interest before too long, because Jon was awful at showing how he cared. Jon was always out of his depth. 

Being unlikable was difficult. Knowing exactly why you are unlikable, because of fundamental parts of your personality that you have tried so many times to change, that’s even harder. Since Georgie, Jon had withdrawn, accepting that while some people were stubborn enough to tolerate him; maybe even drink, go to parties and dance with him, share a flat until the lease ran out, make him cups of tea; despite, despite, despite all that he’d never really be accepted into a group of friends. There was so point trying. People would come and go at their greatest convenience. That was okay.

But Martin made him want to try.

He’d done something right. He’d got this right; he’d given Martin a book and Martin had liked it, and Martin had given him a book and he was loving it. Maybe he could keep trying. Maybe, with a few weeks and a bit of luck, he wouldn’t be an imposter in their group anymore.

The golden sunlight and the easy conversation were making him feel optimistic. They only stayed for half an hour, but it was lovely, it was thoroughly lovely.

“Would you like your jumper back?” Jon said, in a very small voice.

Yeah, maybe Martin could be a friend. If he played his cards right. A friend, wouldn’t that be nice?

-

Jon was making good steed with his latest translation when he was cornered in the Social Sciences library by Professor Elias Bouchard.

After their meeting, he was feeling good. It had been less personal than usual, both Tim and Sasha feeling guilty for wasted time and really cracking on with their individual foci. Jon had delegated the lead of Samson Stiller’s extended family and the closed missing persons case (why was it closed? Why was it closed if a body had never been found?) to Tim and Martin, who were happy to chip away at whatever they could find. Meanwhile, Sasha was doing more social media digging. She was a bit of a genius, Jon knew. Brains of the operation. And no, he wasn’t being insecure about it, no matter what Martin seemed to think.

He wanted to keep the pace they had now, and with a cup of tea and this newfound momentum, he was tearing through this translation. Jon had read it before; it was infamous for it’s seeming references to narcotics, and implications of a criminal underworld not dissimilar to modern societies, but Jon was most interested in the odd descriptions of a ‘package’. He was just double-checking seasonal patterns in the first century when a shadow appeared over his desk.

“Jonathan,” he said, eyes piercing and hands folded in a way that made Jon’s skin crawl.

“Ah.”

Jon didn’t _dislike_ Professor Bouchard, per se. He had no good reason to; Elias had always been helpful and thorough, maintaining professional boundaries that Jon admired and quite honestly wished more professors respected. Not that he was one to talk; sneaking into private gardens with assistants on a project he was leading; God, what was he thinking. But there was something markedly unsettling about Professor Elias Bouchard.

His stature wasn’t imposing, and in fact, he would’ve been very unremarkable if not for the sharp angles of his face and suit and fucking nasty smirk. He dressed more like an oil tycoon than a professor, slick and tailored and greasy and grey, the clip of £500 dress shoes on laminate. And his face was always smug, like a weasel, a weasel whose piercing and shifting green eyes knew far more than you did and were watching the dusty corners of your brain scramble to put the pieces together.

“I’m so sorry to disturb you, Jonathan, as I know you’re terribly busy.” His eyes were glinting like they were sharing an inside joke, but Jon didn’t know what the joke was, and he was starting to sweat. Elias just continued to look delighted. “But it’s come to my attention we haven’t touched bases in a while. I apologise, it’s entirely my fault, I should’ve got in touch sooner.”

He wasn’t apologising in the slightest, Jon knew. “Oh, no worries. Do you think we could schedule in next week, maybe? It’s just, I have a lot of meetings with the group and I need to get this done beforehand, and—”

“Ah, I’m afraid that won’t do. See, as your supervisor, we’re supposed to have weekly contact, if not more, so we really shouldn’t put it off another week…” Elias made a half-hearted performance of thoughtfulness. “As a matter of fact, I have a free slot right now. It shouldn’t take more than half an hour of your precious time.”

Bastard. He knew Jon was skipping meetings and this was his plan all along. “Yes, that’d be great it’s just I urgently need to complete this task for our next meeting, and we’ve been meeting as a group as often as possible so—”

Elias rested a hand on Jon’s back. Jon resisted the urge to break his nose. “Excellent. I am so glad you’ve been making use of the seminar room; you can tell me all about it in my office.”

And that’s how Jon spent half an hour squirming in a lumpy chair in Elias’ airless office, trying desperately to talk around the truth.

See, firstly, a lot of people didn’t trust Elias, and Jon was starting to see where they were coming from. He’d not always acted quite so suspiciously; but, off the bat, when Jon mentioned the strangely dated statements, Elias had outright told him to drop it. And then Sasha had found an article about those very statements, and about the motif of the eye that just kept cropping up in relation to all this supernatural nonsense, bookmarked on the desktop of his computer.

On the desktop, too. Almost like it was waiting to be discovered.

He couldn’t tell Elias that he’d outright ignored his commands, and he certainly couldn’t let on how suspicious all these supernatural connections were. Elias was linked in this web; probably not malicious, probably another innocent bystander, but undoubtedly linked. 

Jon couldn’t let on he knew anything. This was proving to be difficult, as it seemed the pair of eyes that watched, attentively, so fucking attentively, over a monochrome folder and a fountain pen, God. They were boring into his skull. Seeing through each thinly woven lie until Jon was faltering and sweltering and checking his phone, desperate for any excuse to leave this office and go home.

Eventually, Elias seemed sated. He blinked; had he been blinking? Had he blinked at all this whole time?; and laughed airily. Jon didn’t know what was funny.

“Sounds very thorough, Jonathan. I’m glad to hear you’ve gelled so well with your assistants already.”

“Sorry, Professor Bouchard—”

“Call me Elias, please.”

“Right. Um, sorry, I. Just have an awful lot of work and I was wondering…”

He laughed again. “You’re an adult, Jonathan, you don’t need to ask for permission all the time. Dear me. I’ll release you from my clutches, I guess.”

Jon laughed awkwardly, gathering up his belongings with no disguised haste. He was halfway through the door when Elias cleared his throat.

There he was. Poised like a self-appointed god at his desk, smile generous, hand extended to continue his notes without even looking at the page. “And Jon? Remember my advice for the coming weeks.”

“Uh, which advice, Professor? You’ve given me a lot, um. Recently.”

Elias closed his eyes like a contented cat, but Jon could see the lines of tension through his body. Poised like gods over their altars, poised like cobras over their prey. “This isn’t some juvenile pursuit. You don’t have the time to try and solve all the big questions; it’s better to start small.”

Jon never remembered him saying anything of the sort.

“Yes,” Elias hummed, considering. “I’d encourage you to stay within the lines. I’ve been reading your file, actually, and the files of your—ah— _chums._ Fascinating stuff. It’s incredible what extensive information the university keeps on all it’s students, really paints quite the picture. All confidential, of course, I do hope none of it gets leaked. It does make you wonder, doesn’t it? How an English student ended up on an Egyptology project?”

As Jon raced down the corridor and into the open air, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d just been threatened. 

-

 **Private Message**  
Jon: Hey, I hope you’re doing well. Would be nice to catch up soon etc. If you don’t mind.  
Jon: Just wanted to ask about Elias Bouchard. Why do you and Basira hate him so much? Did something happen?  
Jon: I mean I’m not disagreeing. Just curious.  
Daisy: are u coming to the party 2nite. in the flat above us. would be cool i think  
Daisy: yeah basira and i are trying to get him fired  
Jon: Okay? Why?  
Daisy: he’s a creep and he’s involved in a few scandals. like there’s this woman who left the uni halfway through her masters, she was an archaeology student like u. anyways six years later she reports him  
Daisy: he was threatening to leak some personal information. so she was forced to bail. i think he must’ve been her supervisor too  
Daisy: university said the claim was too old to be taken into account. didn’t believe her. arseholes  
Jon: So you’re going all vigilante justice?  
Daisy: the board says there wasn’t enough of a case against him. we’re building one.  
Jon: What was her Masters on?  
Daisy: oh. egyptology  
Jon: Right.

-

Jon was going to go to the party. And Jon was going to have a good time. And Jon was going to drink until the creepy little face of Elias Bouchard was erased permanently from his mind.

At least, that was what he was telling his reflection in the mirror as he tried to find a suitable outfit.

Being in the midst of this mess felt like trying to keep afloat in a stormy ocean. He’d think for an afternoon, think for a brief moment in a garden under a willow tree, that all this stress and confusion was okay. In fact, there were moments when he was tearing through a translation where he felt so blisteringly alive.

But that encounter with Elias had reminded him of everything that was _off_ about this. It had turned his stomach inside out, and he desperately needed stress relief. Preferably ethanol-based, but if that wouldn’t do, a bit of company might tide him over.

He picked up his phone and found Martin Blackwood in the contacts. Martin picked up on the first ring.

_Jon? You alright?_

“Perfectly fine,” Jon said stiffly. “There’s a party in Basira and Daisy’s building. Have you heard about it?”

Martin faltered. _I mean, yeah. We’re all going. Tim hasn’t shut up about it on the group chat, I assumed you’d seen it and were just airing us…_

“Oh. Okay. Good.” There was a pause. If Jon listened carefully, he could hear static and the gentle breaths of Martin on the other side of the line. Just, there, for a moment, just a moment of presence without proximity. “In that case? What are you wearing? And what are you drinking? And how are you getting there, cos I mean, I don’t know what time to get there, and I really don’t want to turn up alone, and—”

_Woah, slow down. One thing at a time, yeah?_

-

One thing at a time. Jon tried that out.

First of all, he found half a bottle of pink gin in the fridge, yelled for Georgie, Melanie answered saying help himself and to _please_ leave the flat for a very long time. He poured himself a glass with some flat lemonade, Martin still on the line, then they switched to FaceTime and started comparing outfits and drinking together. They chatted about a film Martin had liked and Jon hadn’t seen, dancing to different playlists in their different rooms and laughing. It felt frivolous and fun.

When Martin finally hung up, Jon pissed, decanted the gin into an old Sprite bottle, and impulsively picked up a mascara wand. He hadn’t used it in ages; it was gummy and clumped his lashes, but with a bit of smudging he looked…okay.

Better than usual. He stared at his reflection until an obnoxious car horn sounded outside. _I’ll beep for you at 7:30 and we’ll be fashionably late,_ Tim had texted him. It was 8:11, which was probably beyond the fashionable threshold.

Tim’s car smelt like stale takeaway and artificial pine and his aftershave. As Jon slipped into the backseat, Sasha was in the passenger seat, mercilessly bullying Tim for his music taste and Tim was arguing back with even more fervour and Martin was wearing that forest green polo shirt Jon said he liked.

“Hey. They’ve been like this the whole journey. It has been the longest ten minutes of my life.” Jon just laughed, barely plugging his seatbelt before Tim set off, way over the speed limit. He was finding it hard to look directly at Martin. The shirt made his eyes pop.

“Are you designated driver for today, then, Tim?” Jon asked conversationally, to distract the two of them. Sasha definitely had a point about the music, though. It was awful.

“Oh no, Jonathan. Oh never.” Tim met Jon’s eyes in the rear-view mirror, careening past a few traffic cones. Something about eye contact with Tim was _disarming._ Maybe it was his aggressively flirtatious attitude to life; maybe Jon was just anxious and overreacting.

“Timothy!” Sasha scalded, and Tim was back to the grinning back-and-forth.

“No no no, I would never drink and drive, angel. I’ll collect the car in the morning. A friend from drama soc owes me a favour, so I’m using his driveway for the night. I am free to drink the night away!”

Martin let out a supportive but frankly pathetic whoop. The pet name had thrown Sasha off balance for a few seconds, but she was recovering.

Jon’s stomach was churning unpleasantly, nerves sparking with familiar adrenaline that could’ve once been excitement but tended to manifest as violent anxiety. The mascara had given him enough of a boost to not bail and spend his evening reading, but, sweating in the backseat, he was starting to regret it.

As an observer, Tim and Sasha and Martin’s dynamic was familiar to him. It was comforting. That didn’t stop him from squirming.

“What a relief for us all.”

Tim gave Sasha a shit-eating grin, caressing the steering wheel. “Don’t even worry about the car. She’ll be all safe for the night, won’t you, gorgeous?”

“Do you two want some alone time?” Sasha said dryly. They all laughed.

-

They arrived at the party. Jon was no longer laughing.

He wanted to just—turn around and leave and maybe go to another country, because, oh my God, it was so crowded and loud and overwhelming and he couldn’t breathe and. And.

He was about to turn to Martin for, something, a word of support or a smile, maybe, but he had spotted someone from his course and was being dragged over to a conversation. Similarly, Tim had been spirited away into the crush of bodies the moment they walked through the door.

He looked at Sasha, seeing his own discomfort reflected on her face. “I don’t mean to be a downer, but this—”

“Is absolutely awful and we shouldn’t have come,” she finished.

“ _Exactly._ ” The solidarity of introverts was powerful, he found.

They stood there, just on the fringes of the crushing crowd, allowing themselves time to breathe. Jon tried reminding himself that he wanted to be here. And he was going to stick it out, and support Sasha, too, even if a flat full of drunk students was quite literally his idea of hell.

He’d make a night out of it. He’d promised Daisy, and he’d promised Martin, and Sasha was breathing a little too erratically, and he was trying this out. Selflessness.

“Shall we find something to drink? Brave the tide?” He extended a hand to her, hoping desperately this was okay, hoping this wasn’t crossing boundaries.

She giggled. “Go on then.”

The kitchen, it was worth it. It was much quieter, and a little darker, one open window letting in a breeze sweet with the hopeful warmth of spring. Jon spotted an unopened bottle of peach schnapps, and then he spotted Daisy.

She was sat comfortably on the counter, alone but grinning, legs swinging. It was incredible how much she blended in when she was like this, breathing steadily and not all tense and drawn and aggressive.

It occurred to Jon that he’d only seen Daisy without Basira twice before, and both of those times were rather negative experiences. Without her, Daisy was either threatening or upset, and probably both, at different intensities.

“Fancy seeing you here.” But she seemed fine now. Confident, even. “Basira’s outside.”

“It’s good to see _you_ , Daisy.”

“Yeah, whatever,” she said dismissively, but Jon glimpsed the smile she was hiding with the rim of her cup.

“Hey, Daisy. Busy out there, isn’t it?” Sasha still looked markedly uncomfortable. Daisy caught Jon’s eye, and in one motion he had found a glass and Daisy was filling it with peach schnapps.

“Does that not need a mixer?” said Sasha, bemused, as Daisy eagerly pressed it to her.

“Nope. Drink up!”

Jon didn’t want to force her. He had first-hand experience of using alcohol to deal with social situations, a depressant for all the worries and blunders, a device to blame his lack of filtering on, just something, just a little something, to tide him through the night. It had been bad. He liked to think he was over it. He didn’t want to push this onto Sasha.

But she was an adult, and he was going to have a good night, and a good night meant looking out for people to make sure they were having fun too. Plus, it was only one drink. Plus, if anybody asked it was _also_ Daisy’s fault.

He’d wound himself up again with all the thinking, which had been his issue for as long as he could remember. Alcohol switched his brain off. Then, he could switch it back on again with another of his vices, nicotine countering the oblivion with it’s stimulation, and he would feel like he was floating on a lake of black water and he’d burn through the night feeling alive without having to think about it all the time, and _God_ , he really fancied a cigarette and another drink and maybe he wasn’t as in control as he thought.

“What’s going on in there,” said Daisy, tapping the side of his head with her cup. He’d zoned out again. She was elevated on the counter, and had always been taller, so he had to crane his neck to speak.

“I’m thinking about vowels in the Phoenician alphabet. And you?”

Sasha snorted, her face beginning to brighten with the booze. Daisy rolled her eyes, and Jon assumed she was gearing up to complain about how boring and insufferable he was, when Basira materialised from the edges of the crowd.

“Way less people in the garden. Got cold though. Hi Sasha, hi Jon!” The two of them murmured their greetings.

Basira pushed through the two of them to assume a position by Daisy, their backs against the wall and their eyes on the door. It was defensive; everything with them was. Jon tried not to eavesdrop as Basira lowered her voice, checking up on Daisy.

“I’m fine, don’t worry, ‘Sira.”

Jon cleared his throat. “So. Who’s the host of this party, then?”

Daisy grinned, whispering conspiratorially. “You mean you don’t know the host? It’s very exclusive, invite only. Careful the bouncers don’t find out you’re not on the list.”

Okay, Daisy was joking. This was unusual. Daisy was making a joke. Jon was not drunk enough to process this. “You invited us!” he protested weakly, and Daisy seemed to accept the banter, and Jon felt a wave of relief so strong he had to lean back on the cabinet a little bit. The thrill of getting a social interaction _correct_ was beyond anything the booze and cigarettes could do. _Christ_.

Sasha and Basira were valiantly engaging in small talk beside them, and Sasha was still shifting in her nicest ankle boots, eyes darting every-so-often towards the door. Jon was just plotting how to make her relaxed without just forcing more drinks on her when the answer announced itself obnoxiously to the group.

“Hey ladies! Crim any Ologies lately?”

“That doesn’t even pretend to make sense.”

“Tim!”

Tim was here, and just like that, Sasha came alight. She was beaming with all of her being, and Tim met her eyes and so was he. Tim was the opposite of Sasha in many ways; he was a performer, the kind that thrived at parties and had the right word and a friendly glance to spare for everyone.

But just then, he had only eyes for Sasha. In that unconscious way they do in films.

Witnessing the two of them and that stretching moment of eye contact, Jon felt he understood a little bit more about—well, everything. _Things_ , and love, and all that. He’d assumed what they had was just a fling, but evidence suggested otherwise.

It was so lovely to be proven wrong.

Daisy cleared her throat, and the bubble between them burst. They kept smiling, though, and looking at each other when the other looked away.

“Where’s Martin?” Jon asked, purely to dissipate the tension, and also because he was going to make sure that _everybody_ was enjoying their night, and those two were ticked off the list. No other reason.

“In the living room. You guys realise you’re blocking the drinks, right?”

“Yes,” said Daisy.

As it happed, Martin was nowhere to be found in the living room. However, Jon settled down well enough, finding a sofa arm to perch on with Daisy, happy enough with his refilled drink and the nice company. Basira had disappeared back into the crowd, giving Daisy a last thumbs up, and Tim and Sasha were leaning on the wall, paying no mind to all the bustle.

“What are you drinking?”

“Robinsons’ squash,” Daisy said, and gave Jon a stern look when he laughed. “Is that funny? They had some in the fridge so I figured I could have a bit. I don’t usually buy it.”

“Are you sober then? Like, as a choice?” It was probably a bit of an invasive question, but Daisy didn’t seem to mind.

“Yeah. I’ve never really seen the appeal. I like being in control of things. You ever tried meditation?”

Jon had not tried meditation. Jon couldn’t think of anything worse than sitting still and being alone with his head for an extended amount of time. He took a long sip of his drink.

Daisy laughed at his wrinkled nose. “Yeah, my reaction too. But I figure it doesn’t have to all be bullshit cultural appropriation and mindfulness and sitting cross-legged on a yoga mat. Like, you can find your own way to weave meditation into your habits. It just…makes things easier.”

Easier. Jon wished he could switch his brain off. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, uh. You ever tried knitting?”

Jon flushed. He was feeling warm, flushed with some cheap, nasty whiskey and the lasting light-headedness from his pre drinks. He was also feeling warm from the body pressed against him, in casual proximity that he craved but could never seem to initiate.

“Isn’t it a bit…old lady?”

Daisy laughed. “Nothing’s old lady in our postmodern, post gender binary world.” She reached out a thumb to wipe away where Jon’s mascara had smudged. Her hand was cold, but sometimes actions hold their own kind of warmth.

“I can crochet. Haven’t in years, though.”

“Well I’d recommend. Stick some music on, and just focus on it for half an hour. It’s just nice.”

“Just nice. Okay.”

There was a bit of a gap, there, in Jon’s memory of the night. Daisy was there and then suddenly she wasn’t, and Basira had introduced him to some new people, and more drinks had been pushed into his hands, and the people had made small talk as he got progressively drunker, and before he knew it the room was a blur and he was on a _mission._

He found Tim and Sasha and Martin all at once, the three of them squeezed onto one stair. If Jon was sober, he would’ve observed the easy intimacy of the scene, seen the lack of space for another person, and walked on discreetly. Jon wasn’t sober, though.

“Hey.” He said, just loud enough for them to hear him, but no louder. It was so warm in here. Should he sit on the stair below them? Should he just stand? Thinking was like untangling a ball of string, but Martin saw him before he had time to get frustrated.

“Jon!” he said gleefully. It was Martin he’d been looking for, Jon realised belatedly. He’d been looking for Martin all night.

“Martin.” He was all ruddy and smiling wide. Jon forgot what he was doing, suddenly.

“Um, sorry to disturb you,” he said on instinct.

“What are you sorry for?” Martin was drunk. Jon could relate. Sasha was drunker, but Tim was mostly sober and studying Jon’s face.

“You do realise we _actively choose_ to hang out with you, right? Like, you’re our friend. You know that, right?” he said.

Jon did not know that until now, standing in the stairwell of a block of flats, arms hanging and head light from booze that wasn’t his. _Friend._ He was too shy and too awkward and too tone deaf and too snappy and too boring, but Tim was shuffling onto Martin’s lap and gesturing him to join them on the stairs. Shoulders knocking.

Jon rested his thigh against Martin’s and let his head drop onto Sasha’s shoulder. It was so nice. He didn’t feel the need to speak at the moment, and for him, it was _enough_ to listen to their chattering.

Sometimes, when you have had too much to drink, life becomes a tunnel vision, and the light at the end is a warm stairwell and the shoulders of friends, casual intimacy to last through the cold nights.

-

It was midnight, and Jon was still thinking about the cold night outside the window, when Sasha stood and announced she was going to go and piss.

“Come with me, Tim?” she said, eyebrows waggling. Tim didn’t hesitate.

Beneath the dull static of his consciousness, Jon felt a stab of urgency. Martin seemed to read his mind.

“It’s okay. Tim wouldn’t. It’s just, like, a friend thing.”

More human behaviour to evade his understanding. Trust was a part of friendship, right? Jon felt new to this all, but deep down he knew Martin was right and Tim would never try anything when a partner wasn’t in their right mind. Regardless of all those looks of love.

“Okay.” Jon was suddenly aware of how small this stairwell was and how big Martin was, against him, the buzzing of so much human potential. It made him giddy. “Do you want to get some fresh air?”

The outside world was boundless, the sky and the dazzling stars going on forever. For a moment, Jon felt invincible, and Jon felt like he finally understood what infinity meant, and Jon felt no less giddy than he had before with Martin close beside him.

He wanted to hold Martin’s hand, so he did.

 _Martin,_ with his niceness. He was the one who was better with words, and also with actions, like when he’d made Jon a snack earlier today, and Jon suspected the crux of it was, actually, Martin was just better at friendship and Jon was perpetually awful with emotions and other people and anything that moved too fast or too slowly.

But right now, the world was going at the right pace for him. “I like our little adventures,” Jon said, which very transparently meant _I like spending time with you,_ and he was rewarded with a dazzling smile that seemed to light up in the fuzzy orange of a streetlight.

Orange and blue, that bright orange and deep blue, the blurry contradictions of night-time. It was beautiful. The air was turning, spring to summer, and with it the promise of longer evenings. More nights like these. Jon wondered if Martin would feature in his nights, and on a whim, he shaped a future around Martin. That was a friend thing, right? 

Things would be easier with Georgie and Melanie, and he’d spend time with his friends forever and they’d love him like he loved them. He’d never have to worry about not being important. And one day he’d die, and they’d play cool music at his funeral and cry, a bit, but laugh too, at a swirling montage of stupid memories.

Originally, this had been about making sure everyone had a good night. Martin was smiling, which probably meant he was having a good night. Jon didn’t know what it was about anymore.

“Where are we going?” Martin said, giggly. Jon suddenly realised that they were walking. Or, rather, he was dragging Martin while his legs lead the two of them somewhere. Lowered inhibitions, it was, which meant Jon’s restless body just _did_ all the things it wanted without asking for permission. This meant dancing and going on adventures.

“I don’t know, but we sure are _going,_ ” Jon replied. He felt lit up, and Martin sped so they were side by side, and then Martin was leading, and then Martin was _running_ and so was Jon. Racing each other through empty streets until they were breathless and giggling.

Oh, they were thoroughly lost and so far away from the party. That wasn’t important. No, all Jon could think about was collapsing on the concrete together.

“Look,” he said, pointing at nothing in particular. The sky was very big, wasn’t it, and it wasn’t making sense anymore. Jon didn’t care. He was tired and so closed his eyes and squeezed Martin hand, imagining that their clasped hands were the only thing saving him from falling backwards into the stars.

Martin squeezed back. He was warmer than the night and the parties.

“Tim and Sasha, huh? That’s a thing,” Martin said, his voice aimless and wistful. He was still panting from their running, and Jon opened his eyes again just to watch the rise and fall of his chest.

“It’s a thing.” Jon’s head was so _heavy_ , it was so hard to turn and impossible to hold it up long enough to meet Martin’s eyes. Jon missed Martin’s eyes. “They’re very much in love, aren’t they.”

“You think it’s love?” Martin’s voice was very small.

“Yeah I do. Why wouldn’t it be?” It was a good word. Jon liked the word and only used it honestly. “Do you want a cigarette?”

Martin giggled. “I wouldn’t normally, but go on then.”

Jon was peering into his jacket pocket, fumbling for his pack and his lighter, when he asked the question. No need for eye contact. “Have you ever been in love?”

Martin squeaked just as Jon emerged again. He’d shuffled away when Jon dropped his hand and was sitting on the kerb.

Jon hesitated for a moment of rational thought, but this body was so sick of rational thought, so he flopped onto his stomach and sort of— _rolled_ towards Martin, who was in hysterics.

“What the fuck are you doing?” His laugh was infectious, and Jon started laughing too, because what _was_ he doing? The endless strangeness of life, it never failed to elude him. How strange it was to lie on concrete pavement and just enjoy one another’s company. “You really shouldn’t do that while holding a lighter.”

“No, I probably shouldn’t.” He sat up, their faces suddenly very close. Martin was frozen in an expression of silent laughter, and Jon wanted to reach up and touch. So, he did; one palm, outstretched like an offering. Martin’s face was as warm and as grounding as he had imagined.

He was still smiling against Jon’s open palm. Jon committed the shape and curve of his smile to memory.

“Have you, then?” Jon asked, not urgent. Martin eyes were in shadow, so Jon let his hand slip down.

“Yes. I think. But I always feel bad for saying so.” Martin had remembered the question, then. Jon selected a cigarette.

“Why do you feel bad?”

“Sometimes, I…” Martin spoke slower when he was drunk, like his thoughts were falling out of him rather than pulled unwillingly. It was nice to listen to. “I convince myself I’m lying. Like, it’s not love, because it wasn’t reciprocated, or I didn’t know them well enough, or I just want to feel dramatic. I just pretend so I feel like I’m interesting.”

“You are interesting.”

Martin was quiet for a second. “How about you?”

Jon placed the cigarette in Martin’s mouth and then lit it for him, cupping it from the wind. “Breathe in.” The flick of the lighter illuminated his dark eyes and the softest curves of his face, in a brief and ethereal moment. “And, yes, I have.”

He didn’t want to elaborate. Watching Martin breathe smoke into the night air was so peaceful. He was one of those arty photographs and he was a detective in a film, and he was a terrible fire billowing smoke into the sky, and he was everything at once, rolled up and sitting next to Jon.

Jon realised he’d forgotten to light his own cigarette, so he did, and the headrush was so sweet. He wasn’t supposed to be doing this. Relying on booze and smoke and coffee in careful doses to make him feel like a human being. He should feel like a human being _without_ this.

But it was nice. It was so, so nice. Indulgence.

“Do you ever write, like, love poems?” Jon asked. Just to make conversation.

Martin chuckled. “I regret telling you about those poems. No, I find love much easier to read about. Love love love. They should really come up with something else to write about, but I don’t mind reading the same stories a thousand different ways.”

“Like Maurice?” Jon spoke around the corner of his cigarette, because he was used to smoking.

“Exactly like Maurice. It’s just so… _nice_ to have a happy ending. For people like me.” Martin didn’t seem like he was used to smoking. He’d take the cigarette out to speak, watching the smudgey tip with his contemplative gaze, and he was letting it burn away too quickly.

“What do you mean, people like you?”

“Oh. Cos I’m gay. Sorry, I thought you knew that.”

Jon paused, trying to find words that were considerate and supportive enough for this moment. “No, I think I did know that.”

Apparently his painstaking sensitivity hadn’t landed, because Martin was laughing at him. “Oh my God, Jon. Does coming out ever get easier? Less tiring?”

“Course it does. Gets easier every single time, until one day it’ll be the easiest thing you’ve ever done.” Martin didn’t look convinced. “Hey. I’m bi. Romantic, that is, because I’m also asexual. It’s a new word for me and sexual attraction or lack thereof is not exactly something that comes up in polite conversation, so, I haven’t had much practice saying it.”

Jon squinted into the middle distance and waited for Martin’s reaction.

“Didn’t know that.” Martin squashed the butt of his cigarette out on the pavement and tossed it aside like a rebellious teenager. “Glad I could help you practice.”

Jon risked a look to the side. He was smiling, so wide.

“Thank you, Martin,” he said.

“I’m glad you can relate.” Jon had run out of words, so he just let Martin speak as long as he wanted, which happened to be a long time, and Jon loved this slow-moving and chatty version of him. “See, Maurice, it’s revolutionary for its era. How tiring is it? Having our lives, our stories, be revolutionary _just_ because they’re happy? Sometimes I want to be boring.”

Martin could never be boring. He kept on speaking. “It was published the year after E.M. Forster died. He based the story on a couple he knew. And, with his profile, he could’ve got it published with a tweaked story. Make it a morality thing. But no, he wanted, he needed Maurice to have a happy ending, you know? I think it’s beautiful.”

Jon leaned back and took in the stars. “I think you’re right.”

And Jon wished he could remember every single word of Martin’s ramblings, but he was too happy and too dizzy and so he didn’t remember more than the smudge of Martin’s profile against the deep sky.

-

When Jon had figured out his hands enough to order an Uber, and he’d watched Martin disappear into his flat with a little wave, the exhaustion hit. The living room was dark, and he was considering just crashing on the sofa, when he saw _them_.

Melanie and Georgie were curled up in the shadows in a way Jon couldn’t pretend was platonic. Not anymore. He’d done a good job at ignoring the evidence but something about Georgie’s nose tucked into Melanie’s neck, it meant…

Before his brain could catch up, he was unfolding a quilt and draping it over their sleeping bodies. Then he went to bed alone.

-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [RQBB fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26181811) !!!!
> 
> thank you for reading &i hope you enjoyed!! it was so disgustingly fluffy wasn't it. absolute self indulgence.
> 
> if u guys have Podcast related socials pls drop them in the comments!! my tumblr is rave-witch-69


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the aftermath of last night's party, Jon catches up with the other three in the group. It seems that last night was a significant night for Tim and Sasha. Meanwhile, Jon opens up to Martin and continues looking into the mysterious disappearance of Samson Stiller. Where did he go, and why? And why is their supervisor Elias Bouchard trying to create suspicion between the group?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> very liberal use of italics in this chapter which was annoying to format. i'm not caught up on Magnus as i'm terrified to even LOOK at the new episodes haha but i am hoping to make strides on this fic before it finishes. i WILL complete this story scouts honour
> 
> enjoy the new chapter !!!

**Private Message from _Tim Stoker_**  
Tim: hav e u seen sash  
Jon: Sorry, I only just saw this. I went home before so probably not.  
Tim: fuck  
Tim: don’t worry abt it boss. have a good one  
Jon: You too!

-

Jon was grievously hungover and, against better judgement, making pancakes.

“You hate eating in the mornings,” Georgie commented, in lieu of a greeting.

“Good morning to you too.” He poured mixture into the pan sternly.

“What even is happening today? Have you murdered the real Jon and replaced him with an evil clone?” She busied herself with the cafetiere. Georgie had always liked her fancy coffee, and she’d started preparing extra for Melanie.

“Yes, that sounds about right,” he said, trying and failing miserably to flip a pancake. Melanie walked in just in time to see him drop it on the floor and made no attempt to hide her mocking laughter. “Oh, fuck off.”

“He’s so grumpy all the time, George, you should’ve warned me.” She went straight towards Georgie. Jon watched in his peripheral as they linked arms, the familiarity and easy comfort of early mornings seeming so foreign to his foggy mind. “What’s the occasion? Got a date?”

She berated him on purpose, Jon knew, but it was okay. “Yeah, actually. A study date.”

“With Martin?”

“Why would it be with Martin? He’s an undergraduate.” He should text Martin. Matin was probably hungover too, and, oh God, had he said stupid stuff last night? He remembered their conversation, clear as day, but Jon was bad at social cues even when he was sober. The whole coming out thing had been intensely awkward. Had Martin been desperately trying to get Jon to leave him alone, waiting for an excuse to fuck off?

“I’ll get the syrup,” said Georgie, interrupting Jon’s train of thought. The pancake was burning.

“They’re not _for_ you! Sasha’s coming over.”

“I’m sure you can spare a couple.” Georgie smiled with her tongue between her teeth, cheeky and challenging. That smile, it had been one of the first things Jon noticed about her. He still loved it.

“Whatever. Just leave me a bit of coffee.”

It was true; he hated eating in the mornings, especially anything sweet. All those people who swore by indulgent hangover cures, of full English or waffles or McDonalds, were full of shit, because hungover Jon couldn’t even _look_ at a piece of toast without wanting to hurl. But this was a nice thing for Sasha. He was committed to doing nice things, for his… _friends._

“Are you going to be home for tea?” Georgie asked, eyes smiling over the rim of her mug. She’d grabbed Jon’s favourite one, with a vintage Cyberman printed on the side. She’d bought it for him, as an advance housewarming present. It was his most practical mug, Jon told himself.

“Do you mean dinner?” Melanie wrinkled her nose. “Don’t tell me you call it tea.”

“That’s the right word!”

Jon opened his mouth, but Melanie whipped towards him before he could speak, her mouth hard and grinning. “I bet you call it supper or some shit.”

Jon flushed. He had called it supper, or at least, that’s what his grandmother had called it. That habit had long since been teased out of him, along with many posh-sounding idioms that he’d picked up from her.

“Leave him alone, Melanie.” Georgie knew all his embarrassing quirks, as friends tended to. As much as he wanted to erase his and Georgie’s relationship from his past, just pretend that they were close friends and nothing more, these four walls were filled with tender sentimentality that he wanted to screw up in a ball and throw out the window. The past just—couldn’t be shaken.

“I am around for dinner, yes.” But he wouldn’t give up hope yet. Already they were building the new normal. Jon had surprised himself how, after a few blips, he’d accepted Melanie quickly into his home and his routine and his _life._

“Okay, good, ‘cos I’m cooking.”

“And it’s going to be delicious!”

At this point, Jon’s phone began to ring, and in the surprise, he burnt his hand on the pan. “Fuck! Can one of you get it?”

Melanie took the phone out of his back pocket, apparently unbothered by boundaries while Jon continued with his pancake awkwardly.

“Aw, shame. Sasha says she’s dying very slowly. Guess you’ll have to go to hers instead.”

-

Sasha shared a house with a bunch of other post-grads, in a cute little neighbourhood ten minutes from the station.

Her roommates ranged from slightly edgy to downright terrifying. Jon was greeted by a blank-faced goth with steel-tipped boots, who nodded at him and wordlessly took the Tupperware from his hands.

“I’m here for Sasha?” he said reluctantly, but he’d already disappeared, so Jon decided to explore.

The first door was closed and led to a small living room. There were two sofas and a very small TV, and it was very clearly occupied by students, from the mismatched cushions and the ashtray made of plastic babies trapped in resin, to the lingering smell of stale coffee and sweat. Regardless, it was comfortable, and Jon smiled a little when he spotted Sasha’s keys between the pages of a book; her fluffy duck keyring was instantly recognisable. He picked it up, and it quacked pitifully.

Maybe the man had taken his Tupperware to the kitchen. The next door was ajar, and the narrow and dusty dimness was pierced right open with sunlight and music and the slight smell of bacon. Ah. The fleeting intimacy of other people’s breakfast.

He tapped on the door, and it swung open, revealing a shiny room all full of light. Sure enough, somebody was frying bacon, back to Jon, unaware they were being observed. Jon felt…almost guilty, to invade this moment that wasn’t his, all crusty and restless in a kitchen that gleamed.

The window was open, wide, a breeze just slightly too cold emerging from the plain garden, and Jon inhaled everything he could.

A voice came from behind him. “Hey. There you are.”

Jon had only ever seen Sasha at her most careful and put-together. Her clothes were always ironed and tastefully neutral, blue jumpers and grey trousers and a brown bag and sensible shoes, just like every other hardworking student. Here, unsuspended by strings, she was almost unrecognisable.

Her hair had no product in, not even a basic plait, with curls reaching out at every angle and sticking in the shape of her pillow. More pillow marks were across her face, and glitter and kohl traced her dark circles where she hadn’t quite managed to budge the makeup. She held the missing Tupperware aloft, her shoulders wrapped in a single quilt, looking like the dishevelled monarch of mornings and cold pancakes.

“We should reheat those pancakes,” said Jon awkwardly.

“Did you make them?”

“Tim’s recipe.” This was a po-faced lie; all pancakes have the same recipe, obviously; but it was also the right thing to say, because Sasha’s mouth was turning upward. “He texted me this morning. To say they’re a good hangover cure, you know, for you. So, you’ve only got him to thank.”

She did finger guns, in a fleeting but perfect impression of Tim. Jon smiled weakly. “Hey, Helen. Got any bacon spare? I’ll trade you for a pancake.”

“Very uneconomical, but okay darling.” That didn’t sound like a word, but the figure frying bacon said it with confidence. “Just save me some in the fridge, I’m off.”

“You want any bacon?” Sasha offered, but then clicked her fingers. “No wait. You’re vegetarian.”

“You remembered.” Jon’s chest was warm. Bacon smelt better than it tasted, anyway.

“’Course I did. Right, I’ll get these going, if you want you can talk at me with the project stuff, catch me up to speed. I’m sorry I wasn’t more prepared this morning.”

“It’s okay.” There was a lump in Jon’s throat, a physical thing, and he pushed it and pushed it and pushed it. “I like just spending time with you. This is nice.”

“It really is. We never get to hang out.” She was deftly reheating each pancake on the pan, just a few seconds on each side so they didn’t get burnt any more than they already were. “I love Martin but he’s always _there_ , you know, making it hard for us two to talk. And Tim is…well. Tim is Tim.”

Jon had no idea what _that_ meant, so he just hummed.

“Anyway. How was your night? You look a bit rough, though I can’t talk.” She slid a plate towards him, with a single pancake. Maybe he could get over his fear of hangover breakfasts and have just one. 

“Do you have Nutella? Wait, sorry, what was the question?”

She laughed lightly. “Last night. Review? Worth it? After you wandered off, I barely saw you all night. You were with Martin, right?”

“Hey, you were the one who wandered off!” The Nutella Sasha had found him was untouched, with the foil still on, which Jon thought was impressive in a student house. “Yeah, I was with Daisy for a bit then I found Martin. It was nice; I am glad you didn’t let me run away at the start.”

Sasha loaded up her first pancake with lemon and an ungodly amount of sugar. “Again, I’m pretty sure you were the one stopping me from running off. Is this a cat hair?”

“It’s extra vitamins.” The hair was ginger and crinkly, unmistakably the dastardly work of the Admiral. “Did you? Have a good night, I mean?”

“I did, yes. Thank you.”

She wasn’t going to elaborate, just keep chewing, perched on the counter opposite him.

“Hey, I. I know it’s not like, the project, per say, but I think Elias _threatened_ me yesterday.”

Jon was expecting Sasha to laugh, because admittedly it sounded absurd out loud. His supervisor, so proper and precise, trying to _threaten_ a student? Instead, Sasha leaned a little closer, her eyes wide with conspiracy.

“He’s been weird ever since I found that shit on his computer. The article about the eyes. He’ll always stop me in the corridors, interrogate me about our progress. What did he say?”

“Something about making sure I don’t worry about…the bigger picture? Just focus on the brief of the project, all the stuff he’s approved. So, _not_ our weird statements.” Jon studied his chocolatey pancake, picturing Professor Bouchard’s forced poise as he had been dismissed. “I remember he said something about…looking into the suspicious background of one of my ‘chums’? Implying…I can’t even begin to know. I don’t know.”

“Did he really say chums?” Sasha’s voice curved playfully with the effort of supressing a laugh, and Jon found himself smiling in return. “I mean. We know two things for certain.”

“What?”

“Well, Elias is involved with something. And he really, really doesn’t want us looking any deeper into these prophetic statements. He tried to discourage us off them from the start.”

“Which means we have to look deeper,” said Jon solemnly.

Elias Bouchard was not very intelligent at all, if he thought that he could stop them in their tracks with discouragements and threats. They were students. Curiosity was a _given_.

Jon finished his meal, realising that he hadn’t even thought about the sickly sweetness, and actually it had been very nice. His headache was dissipating, too; this bright kitchen and gentle conversation had done him some good.

More than good; he was revitalised. In fact, he couldn’t wait to get back to researching. 

Sasha’s plate was still stacked high with her helping, and the rasher of bacon she’d scrounged. For all her careful manner, she was not a tidy eater, and the grin she turned towards Jon was endearingly sticky. “These pancakes are amazing. Tim must have some secret trick; I _have_ to know.”

Jon smiled, the overwhelming fondness creeping up on him. “I guess you’ll just have to ask him.”

-  
 **Private Message from _Martin Blackwood_**  
Martin: Are you free tonight?  
Martin: Sorry let me try that again. How are you? How are you feeling? Hungover? Would you like me to send some cat videos to cheer you up?  
Jon: I’m okay, Martin, how are you? Although cat videos are always appreciated. And unfortunately I have agreed to be at home for supper, as Melanie is cooking.  
Martin: Oh that’s cute! Maybe next time!  
Jon: Actually, do you want to come over? We’ve definitely got enough food for four. The more the merrier.  
Martin: Ah I wouldn’t want to impose  
Jon: Martin. PLEASE come over for supper. I would really appreciate your company.  
Martin: Okay!  
Jon: 7pm, then. Do you have any dietary requirements?

-

If you take the cycle path directly to the city centre, then explore the right lanes, you can find a little cobbled square with an independent jewellery shop, a florist, a pizzeria, a vintage clothes shop, and the best coffee shop Jon has ever found.

It’s not about the coffee, really. Jon can’t exactly tell the difference between blends, and besides, he usually gets one of their herbal teas. For him, it’s the hipster man making his coffee who doesn’t even attempt small talk, and instead explains bits of economic theory when Jon hands him money. It’s the cheery yellow cups the beverages are served in, and the bizarre knick-knacks pinned to the wall, the mismatched birthday bunting and amateur photography and fairy lights and exposed wooden stairs with the lyrics to Rick Astley’s ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’ written on with Sharpie.

It was the best place to go and do his latest translation and write-up of Sasha’s findings on Samson Stiller, without fear of interruption. Unfortunately, the universe had other plans.

“That’s my seat,” he sighed.

Tim was wearing square reading glasses which Jon was pretty sure he’d stolen from Sasha. He had a fancy coffee and a hulking anthropology textbook spread across the table. “Hey, Jon. Come here often?”

“Yes. Actually.” This wasn’t Jon’s plan. Tim was obviously not going to agree to helping Jon when he had so much anthropology work in front of him, so was more likely to be a hindrance. How come Jon never got any individual time to work on his _own damn project?_

Jon stood there, hands wrapped around his cheerful yellow mug, until Tim sighed and kicked a chair out for him. “Just sit down, will you. There’s room for both of us.”

“Okay.”

The companionable silence was very nice, for the whole five minutes it lasted.

“Fucking…agricultural practices. Don’t even care.” Tim shoved the textbook away from him, slamming his palms into the table hard enough to make both their drinks spill.

Jon jolted, completely taken by surprise by the outburst. He risked a glace up from his laptop, and Tim was _simmering,_ his hands and eyes restless with furious energy. Up at Jon, drumming at the table, fixing the coffee, staring at the textbook, staring at his shoes, pulling his hair.

“Tim! Do you mind being a bit less…” Tim just glowered at him, daring to say more. But that’s all Jon was going to say. He was too much right now, and Jon felt bad for thinking that when something was so visibly bothering him.

“I’m leaving. See you at our next meeting or whatever.” He shoved the textbook away and stood up.

Fuck. “Tim, wait. I…did something happen with Sasha?”

Tim said nothing, motionless and poised to leave.

“After the two of you went into the bathroom together.” Jon couldn’t stop the disapproval bleeding into his voice. Rationally, he knew Tim was a good guy, but Jon had a tendency to make assumptions, and a contempt for _that_ sort of behaviour which had been so normalised. 

Regardless of the way they looked at each other. Jon hated hook-up culture, and that was how they had begun, wasn’t it?

Apparently, he was awful at hiding his facial expressions, because Tim was _glowering,_ his eyes sparking and knuckles white. He swivelled himself to face Jon and exploded.

“I’m not just some…some shallow _slut_ , you know, I’m sick of everyone thinking that’s all I’m good for. Oh, there goes Tim, he’ll go for anyone, he’s not picky. He’ll buy you a drink and sneak off to the bathroom, it doesn’t have to be deep. Well, maybe I want it to be deep.”

Guilt rose in Jon’s throat, and he lowered his eyes, hyperfocusing on the vase in front of him. It had a couple of sprigs of lavender, which set off the yellow theme really nicely, and Tim was shaking and oh, he’d really put his foot in it now. “Hey. I don’t think that.”

“I just _like_ people. I want to have conversations with them. Hear what they have to say, and I like when it leads to a little bit more, sometimes. But it’s _always_ deep to me.”

Jon breathed, calculating apologies and peace offerings and eventually just had to ask, “What happened with Sasha?”

Tim sagged. “I told her I love her.”

Oh.

The two of them were motionless for a long time, Tim standing, textbook in hand, Jon still sitting with his hands around a mug, the table dividing them. Jon had expected Tim to say a lot of things, but he hadn’t expected this.

It was good, in a lot of ways. Sasha had been happy this morning, if a bit lopsided, and she obviously remembered and felt the same way, or at the very least, was flattered and still fond of Tim.

But it was also bad, when Jon considered the fear frozen on Tim’s face, the way his body shivered and held itself inwards, like a one-person hug, the way his voice had cracked with rage and uncertainty. He was _terrified_.

Love confessions did that to you, Jon noted. It was painful, but he didn’t want it to be painful; he wanted to solve the wrinkle in Tim’s brow. “I think she loves you too.”

“I still fucked up, though,” he said, eyes dropping to the floor. “You can’t spring something like that when they’re drunk. It’s too much.”

“You’re right, but I don’t think you were in the ideal state of mind either. It was a mistake, but you still meant it. And I saw her this morning.”

Tim perked up a little. “Really? How was she?”

“A bit worse for wear, but she kept smiling. Like she had a secret,” said Jon, gently.

“Oh, that’s so _cute._ ” He finally filed his textbook away, and Jon imagined him for a moment, running from the café and buying a bouquet of flowers and running all the way to Sasha’s doorstep. Like the ending to a romantic comedy, and Jon was the sidekick slash wise old man who encouraged him to go after the girl. Jon had never been in a romantic comedy before.

But no, he was sitting down again, taking a sip of Jon’s tea without asking.

“Hey,” Jon protested weakly.

Tim ignored him. “I’m going to give her some time to process it all, then text if I can come over tonight. Or grab some chips, or something. If she’s ready. And then I’ll apologise and explain and just…put it all on the table.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“Hmmm, I’m nervous!” He was vibrating in his seat, a slow grin emerging, looking for all the world like Tim again. It was almost a relief. “No chance I’m getting this anthro done. Fucking agricultural practices. I really don’t care about the implications of getting your milk from a cow as opposed to a goat.”

That sounded quite interesting to Jon, actually, and he felt the urge to share an article he’d read on the ethics of alternative milk sources but had a feeling it wouldn’t be appreciated. “If you want to keep busy, you can help double-check all of the information on Samson Stiller. It’s in Sasha’s handwriting and I’m struggling to read, but I need the sources typed up.”

“Absolutely, boss! I’m the man for the job. Expert in Sasha’s chicken-scratch right here.” He pushed the reading glasses up his nose. Those were _definitely_ stolen from Sasha. “Mind catching me up on the important bits?”

“It’s all from police records, missing person websites, and a lot from the Facebook pages of his family members. We have an address and details of where he grew up, the flat he was renting, etc., although after stealing the eye artefacts, he came back to his childhood home instead. He was last seen in a village just outside Derby, his hometown.”

“Weird.” Tim was already typing away, his hands practically a blur as he transcribed the information. Jon turned back to his own translation, content once more in the relative quiet of work as the minutes ticked by.

“I’m sorry for getting angry.”

Tim’s eyes were still fixed pointedly on his own screen, his voice so very, very quiet, that for a moment Jon thought he’d imagined it. But those hands had stilled and were now fiddling nervously with a ballpoint pen.

“It’s okay.” Jon swallowed and then searched for Tim’s eyes, smiling a little bit when they finally met his. “You’re allowed to get angry, you know. I, uh…I get it.”

Tim opened his mouth as if to argue, but then closed it and grinned.

-

Jon still found other people in his space a little troubling, which was an issue he should’ve thought of before he invited Martin over for supper.

Rationally, Jon knew this was just a casual catch up between friends, but Jon’s brain apparently wanted him to suffer, because now was Martin and he was coming into his space and Jon had invited him specifically and this was starting to feel concerningly like an occasion.

Melanie was currently refusing to tell him what she was cooking.

“Please, Melanie, c’mon. It’s not even for my sake, I want to let him know. It’s polite.”

She stirred the pot that was bubbling over the hob; a slow cook, that should clue Jon in, but his brain just wasn’t _working_ properly; and tutted. “It’s a surprise dinner which means the guests get surprised.”

“That’s not a thing. C’mon. At least a clue. Has it got mushrooms in it? I’m sure we had more mushrooms last time I checked the fridge.”

“Lots of things have mushrooms in them.”

Jon groaned. “What if he doesn’t like mushrooms? I read that only 69% of people like mushrooms, which is staggeringly low, what if he was too embarrassed that he doesn’t like mushrooms and just assumed that we didn’t like mushrooms either?”

“69. Ha.” Melanie grinned at Jon expectantly, but Jon was certainly not immature enough to find that funny, so she just sighed. “You’re making no sense, Jon. If you really want, I’ll get Georgie to text him the dinner menu just in case.”

“Wait, Georgie’s allowed to know and I’m not?”

“That’s cos I actually like Georgie.”

Jon slumped in the kitchen chair. He was insanely tired. It was overstimulation, really, this constant of social interacting, and really all he wanted to do was curl up with a blanket. ALONE. In his own space, away from this kitchen, away from Melanie and Georgie, and away from Tim and Sasha’s romantic dramas.

He hadn’t told Martin about that. Did he know, already? That would be something to look forward to. It would be nice to have, well, a rational take on this. More importantly than that, Jon chided himself, he needed Martin’s rational take on what Elias had said.

In a way, he had signed up for this. He had been the one who wanted to work so hard, to have study meetings at all hours, to translate and translate until his brain was well and truly fried. He hadn’t signed up for the friends, though. That was a nice bonus. Regardless of their _dramas_.

He should get all the notes ready. Martin would be here soon, and work never ended, did it. Jon felt— _strange_ , that he’d invited an assistant to supper, so if he printed off Tim’s typed up notes then they could always talk about the project when conversation ultimately failed. _It was a backup plan._

Martin arrived approximately ten minutes before supper was ready, the pot bubbling over. Jon opened the door to greet him like a good host, just as his grandmother had taught.

“The stew smells amazing, Melanie!” Martin said as he stepped inside.

Jon wanted to cuss out Melanie for stressing him unnecessarily, with words his grandmother had certainly not taught him, but that was the moment his eyes focused on the man standing in his doorway, and—

Well. And it felt like he’d been waiting all day to see Martin’s face.

He was dressed quite smartly, in his particular way. His curls were brushed back semi-neatly, patted down with water, maybe, and Jon almost missed the unruly hairstyle he was accustomed to. His trousers were all fancy and slightly too long, and his shirt was white and ironed, giving an impression of earnestness that Jon was a little bit charmed by.

Yeah, it wasn’t even a conscious thing, it just felt that Jon’s body had rolled out of bed and spent the whole day fumbling, his eyes on a convoluted and twisted path that finally felt complete when they found Martin’s hazel green.

“I brought, uh, some wine. Felt like that was the grown-up thing to do. When you’re invited for dinner.” He shifted self-consciously, laughing a little. Jon wanted to run over there and hug him, maybe, and hold him for a while and laugh about last night, and all the ridiculous things that coloured each day and made life a little more worth it.

For the first time, Jon noticed how Martin’s face echoed his. Maybe Martin wouldn’t mind if he ran over and did exactly that. _Maybe._

Jon was not cowardly, but he was an analyst by nature, and so decided to gather more data. Instead of listening to his muscles, he forced himself to step aside and let Martin in and form the words Thank You For The Wine and then go and check on Melanie’s stew.

God, Martin was looking rather smart. Should Jon put on a blazer or something? He looked scruffy, but Georgie had told him it was part of his charm.

Melanie coughed, and Jon whipped around. She couldn’t have looked scruffier, in that moment, with stew spilled on her front, ripped tights and ill-fitting layers and scary makeup. Hey, maybe Georgie had a type.

There were worse people to be compared to than Melanie, Jon told himself.

-

It is the sweetest and truest and oldest tradition of humans, to gather, and to share the food that they have prepared with the people they love. 

When he was a child, Jon hated ‘family’ dinners. He hated having to wear something nice on Sundays, a scratchy jumper that he wasn’t allowed to get gravy on. And from the age of twelve, when being rude to a great aunt wasn’t seen as cute or funny anymore, he started to really hate family dinners. Hate them with a passion. He’d look around the table, and think, this isn’t what a family is supposed to look like.

This prickling feeling under his skin, the passive aggressive comments, the glances to the side, all at his expense, this wasn’t how family was supposed to feel. The books had said it’d feel different. 

He knew now his grandmother did her best. She forced these get-togethers with distant relatives, so he’d have a family, and just ‘cos he didn’t have a mum or a dad didn’t mean he was _alone._

He still felt lonely, but without his grandmother, it would’ve been worse. She really had tried.

Now—well. The memory of dinnertimes would always taste like loss. Jon used to sit and stare at his plate and, God, he felt like the only one in the whole world.

“I fucking love stew,” Martin said, and Martin didn’t swear all that often which made the whole thing hilarious, and Jon mopped up a bit of sauce with some bread and thought, hey, maybe I’m not the only one in the whole world.

After they’d sated the worst of their appetite, Georgie turned to him, smiling. “So, how’s the project going?”

“Quite well, thank you.” Jon fixed his gaze on Martin, and let himself reflect, for a moment. A lot had changed. For starters, their objective here was completely different; this wasn’t a project anymore, it was a _mystery._ To call it a project felt laughable.

“We’ve all been getting on with our individual research. It’s been very productive.” Martin had caught his eye, with a little, self-conscious smirk. Like they were sharing a joke, but really, there was no joke, just the absurdity of life and the mediocracy of dinner.

“How was your meeting with Sasha?”

“You saw Sasha today?” said Martin, placing his fork down. “How was she?”

“She got off with Tim, didn’t she?” Melanie piped up.

“She’s fine, just hungover. And, um. How did you know about Sasha and Tim?”

“Melanie knows everything,” said Georgie, covering her laugh with her hand.

“Well, not that it’s anybody’s business,” Jon paused to make his tone less haughty, because as much as it wasn’t anybody’s business, he really wanted to keep the peace. “Um, it’s between them. Really. But I believe something did happen, whether or not it was this, uh, going off thing.”

At this, Georgie burst into raucous laughter. “Going off. Yeah. Absolutely.”

“You’re no good at gossiping, Jon. You’re too…morally upright,” said Melanie, her voice snarky, which made Jon pause in his eating.

“That’s a compliment, Jon,” Martin assured him, nudging his foot under the table gently, a hidden point of contact where nobody could see.

Jon had thought as much, but the tone had thrown him off a little bit. 

“Sorry for being so morally upright. I’ll try harder next time,” he said dryly. “But, most importantly, Sasha is doing well. She’s made great progress locating Samson Stiller.”

“Samson Stiller?” Melanie said suddenly.

“Yeah. Martin, I was meaning to mention this, actually, but haven’t had a chance. Sasha had so much she’d found on the internet. I suppose the ceaseless oversharing of modern technology is useful for one thing.”

Georgie laughed abruptly, although he hadn’t been talking to her, and also hadn’t actually said anything funny.

“Anyway,” he continued, slightly put out. “We need to reconvene, but it’ll take a while, and those bloody drama students are still using our room. I don’t suppose you could kick out your flatmates, have a change of scenery?”

Martin shook his head, smiling apologetically around his hand. “Not happening, at least not without a week of notice. Our place is tiny, and they’ve always got shit to do. Sorry.”

“Just use our place again. Melanie and I don’t mind, it’ll stop you from bothering some poor second years.”

At that moment, Jon could’ve pointed out that Melanie was not a legal tenant of this flat. But he didn’t, even as Melanie took a forkful of the stew she had made for all of them, and tapped Georgie’s leg, and fed her, all the time grinning in her self-satisfied way.

Instead, he said: “I suppose that’d be best.”

“Hey,” said Melanie, an uncharacteristic cheer making her voice seem louder and more boisterous and obnoxious with every second that passed. “Make it a study sleepover. Crash on the sofa and all. It’s not like I’m using it anymore.”

“Yes, well,” said Jon curtly. “There’s no need to rub it in.”

Jon had finished his stew quite a few minutes ago, and he didn’t feel like seconds, so he brought his plate to the kitchen and casually walked to his room.

-

“Jon. What was that?”

Martin was darkening his doorway as Jon tapped away at his laptop, far more formidable than Jon was accustomed to. Jon wanted to say that anger from Martin was uncharacteristic; to most people, Martin was backbendingly polite, pandering and nervous and oh-so-considerate.

Jon knew Martin better. Jon knew that first impressions were bullshit, and Martin was—well, he wasn’t an angry person. He was _fierce._ Fiercely caring and fiercely driven and, currently, fiercely glaring right at him.

“What was what?” Jon said.

Martin huffed, closing the door behind him. “What do you have against Melanie? You’ve got this vendetta against her and I know you two don’t see eye to eye but there was no need to turn around and leave when she’d cooked your _dinner,_ for fucks sake.”

“She started it!” Jon protested, feeling rather like an indignant child.

“She didn’t start anything!” Martin wasn’t moving from his position right by the door, but his eyes were so intense that Jon wanted to back away. He didn’t back away, just met Martin’s disappointment with the usual defence, with unflinching stubbornness. Pig-headed, he was. That’s what everyone said.

How could Martin do this? He’d invited him into his _home,_ and he was taking Melanie’s side. “She did, when she was gloating about—about being with Georgie, and everything. Sleeping in her bed.”

Martin deflated. 

“Oh Jon.” His glare melted into sympathy, which made him feel entirely worse. “Jon, she wasn’t gloating at all. That’s…that’s definitely not what she meant it as.”

Jon lay back. 

_Of course_ she didn’t. Of course, of course, he was just being stupid again.

It was just an innocent comment. It hadn’t even meant anything, and now everyone was going to know how insecure and sensitive and _dumb_ he was.

He rolled his head, squishing his face into the pillow so Martin wouldn’t have to look at him. Fuck. “Does it ever get easier?”

Jon didn’t know which thing he was talking about; understanding people, and being replaced, and being set adrift, and being lonely, and being trapped in your head.

Martin came over and sat down next to him, and Jon felt a little bit less lonely.

“How does Georgie and Melanie…make you feel?”

“I’m so sorry about this, Martin. I ruined dinner.”

“Hey. First of all, that’s technically avoidance.” Jon chuckled. Nothing got past him, did it. “Second of all, you didn’t ruin dinner at all. It was a little awkward, sure, but it was nice. They didn’t mind. They’re just worried about you. So, are you going to talk about it, or should I leave you to mope?”

Jon didn’t want Martin to leave, like, _really_ didn’t want Martin to leave. But Martin was perched on the end of the bed, his brow just a little furrowed, looking expectant. So, Jon concluded he’d have to talk about it.

“I miss Georgie.” Martin nodded, his face so grave and drawn that Jon wanted to laugh, just to break the tension. “It’s just my irrational brain. I don’t have feelings for her, you know, and I _know_ she’s still my friend, she tells me all the time. But it feels like I was replaced.”

“I understand why it feels like that. But you’re irreplaceable. I mean, um.” Martin’s eyes met his for a flicker, a fraction of a second, before sinking to the ground. “You can’t just replace people, because you’re more to Georgie than just a _role._ Like, you were more than just her ex, you’re a whole person, Jon.”

Jon sighed, clenching and unclenching his fists, one at a time. “I know. Just felt like it, is all. Like all of a sudden Melanie shows up and nobody even fucking tells me anything. Just says, oh, this is Melanie, she lives with us now, and left me to put the pieces together and figure out they’re in a relationship. And I’m no good at putting pieces together. I’m slow, Martin, Georgie knows that she has to tell me things.”

“You’re not slow. You just. You miss things, sometimes, don’t you, the signs.” Martin smiled sadly. “She really should’ve told you. It’s not fair to be left out the loop. You live with them, and that means communication.”

Jon felt a wave of relief. Okay, either Martin was just pandering to his opinions, or he was _right_. He wasn’t being irrational.

“Thanks, Martin,” said Jon, with absolute sincerity that seemed to catch Martin off-guard. He had frozen, mouth open, about to keep on talking. It made Jon giggle. He looked cute.

“Yeah,” he said finally, then again, laughing, “Yeah!”

Jon rolled over and sat up, suddenly conscious of how messy his hair was, all cowlicked to the side. And he’d brushed it, before, for Martin. 

Martin didn’t seem to mind all the wasted effort. He settled back on the bed, picking up a cushion to hold gently. This was the first time Martin had seen his room, Jon realised. 

“Tim and Sasha, too, huh? It’s all happening,” Jon said amicably, and Martin nodded, leaning his head to the side in a way that made him look all soft and sleepy. The mattress dipped under his weight, like the room that had always been Jon’s sanctuary was shifting and changing around him.

Jon didn’t mind having him here, just close enough that their legs could brush.

“It’s about time they sorted it out, really. Irritating us with all their pining,” Martin said.

“I never knew it was possible to flirt that much and still get embarrassed when you so much as touch.” When Jon stretched his legs out all the way, they could touch Martin’s side. He decided to do it, his socks brushing Martin’s thigh and knee, and once he started to notice all of these points of contact, _he just couldn’t stop noticing._

“Yeah.” Martin smiled, rubbing the back of his neck and staring at the part where their legs just barely brushed. “I hope it works out between them. What did Sasha say today? Wait, shit. Isn’t there work stuff?”

“Honestly, it’s fine. I don’t feel like…working, now, or anything.” No, Jon felt like lying back down and putting his legs in Martin’s lap and staying there for the rest of the night. He didn’t, though. “I actually saw both of them today. Bumped into Tim unexpectedly.”

“And what’s the verdict?”

Jon smiled, not quite sure how to word it. How do you put it into words, when two people find each other, and you look at them and see second-hand the giddy excitement of a new beginning? How do you explain feeling gloriously and exhilaratingly like a side character in a rom com? “They should be working it out around about now. They have…feelings. You know. For each other.”

“Could’ve told you that several weeks ago and saved a lot of trouble.” Jon laughed, half at the joke, and half at the softness of Martin’s voice. It followed that the man beside him was a hopeless romantic. All those notes in the margins of _Maurice_ , all those musings about love stories with happy endings.

“I’m happy for them,” Jon said. He really was. How wonderful it must be, to live through the happy ending. Jon didn’t buy into all that romanticised bullshit, not in the way Martin did, not all the love confessions in the rain. Ultimately, to assume that you are in love is to place breakneck high expectations on a relationship. To over romanticise is to place labels on a life not designed to live up to it.

“Me too. They’re good for each other.”

Life is always going to punch you in the stomach. To love someone is to fulfil a biological impulse for companionship, nothing more. Companionship didn’t demand much. Just somebody to stay with you, until they didn’t.

He was a cynic, of course, but this didn’t mean he couldn’t appreciate love stories. Or appreciate the gentle, easy warmth of Martin, perched on his bed.

Nobody had told Martin to come here. Jon hadn’t even asked, but when he was upset, Martin had followed, and when he thought about it that was maybe the kindest thing anybody had done for him in a very long time. Maybe that’s what he needed. Someone to keep asking the right questions. 

“Thanks for coming tonight, Martin. And everything.”

And everything, which was a big word, which didn’t quite manage to sum up every kind thing Martin had done since they met. Yeah. Furiously kind, he was.

Martin smiled at this, fleetingly, Jon’s words of course not doing justice to the gratitude he felt. Jon’s words never did anything justice, but he’d keep on trying, until he found a better way of communicating.

To make do until he figured it out, he reached out and offered Martin his hand.

It was awkward for a moment, Martin staring, his back upright and tense like he was sitting in a job interview, not a friend’s bedroom. He looked at the hand, like he’d never seen a human hand before, like they were aliens from opposite sides of the galaxy making first contact.

But then he blinked. Smiled. And held Jon’s hand.

They didn’t speak for a while, which was nice, until Martin piped up, his voice small and curious.

“So, what was all the stuff you were talking about with Sasha?”

“Oh, I have more details on Samson Stiller. His hometown, his last known sighting, somewhere by an abandoned farm. I mean, aside from that, we spent half or time chatting shit. Talking about Elias behind his back and everything.”

“Bitching about Elias, huh?” Jon laughed brashly, which elicited an expression of such self-satisfaction that Martin didn’t look like Martin for a moment. “What about him, then? You can’t leave me out.”

Something clicked into place in Jon’s brain. Elias had mentioned something about an English student—saying it was “odd” that an English student was on an Egyptology course. “Elias was talking about you, actually. Said he’d been double checking files. It was very suspicious, apparently, he knew something.”

There was a beat, and then Martin dropped Jon’s hand.

“Martin?” he ventured. He rewinded the conversation, but he hadn’t said something rude, had he? What had he done to make Martin stiffen like that, his eyes fixed forward, his hand empty and so far away from Jon’s?

“I have to go.”

“Okay, is something—”

“Bye!” His voice was cheery enough, but his face was drawn, like a mask, like the words had come from somebody else. Before Jon could react, he’d sprung up, and was striding through the door and across the landing and down the stairs.

“Uh, text me when you get home?” he called out, voice shaking just a little bit.

But Martin couldn’t hear him, and Jon was alone.

-

**Private Message from _Tim Stoker_**  
Tim: achievement unlocked~~ +1 Girlfriend !!!!!

**Private Message from _Sasha James_**  
Sasha: Hey Jon guess who has a boyfriend now !!!!!!

-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sasha is spiral touched in canon lol !! i think it would've been so interesting if she'd met helen, so i made helen her roommate.
> 
> thank you so much for reading !!! <3


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